U.S. gives Saudis a pass on religious persecution

FAITH UNDER FIRE U.S. gives Saudi persecution a pass Kingdom conspicuously absent from State's list of worst violators

Saudi Arabia will be conspicuously absent from a State Department list of the worst violators of religious freedom, confirmed a State Department official who spoke to WorldNetDaily on condition of anonymity.

Secretary of State Colin Powell is expected to release tomorrow the department's annual list of nations subject to diplomatic action because of their "systematic, ongoing and egregious" violations of religious freedom, the official said.

Newsweek magazine first reported that Saudi Arabia will once again not be a "country of particular concern," a designation that requires action by the U.S., ranging from a quiet diplomatic demarche to sanctions.

The independent panel established by Congress in 1998 to promote religious freedom as a U.S. policy goal – the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, or USCIRF – annually recommends to the administration which countries should be on the list of violators, and each year, it regards Saudi Arabia as an obvious choice.

However, America's strategic ally and trading partner has never been selected by the secretary of state, despite the State Department's own repeated assessment that freedom of religion in the kingdom "does not exist."

Nina Shea, one of nine USCIRF commissioners, told WND, nevertheless, she is surprised at the omission this year "because it's incontrovertible that there is no religious freedom in Saudi Arabia."

"It's become clear that this extremist, rigid, Wahhabist interpretation of Islam that is practiced and promulgated in Saudi Arabia is an actual security threat to the U.S.," she said, noting that 15 of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers were Saudi. "[The administration] undercuts our security concerns by soft-pedaling that."

In its 2002 religious freedom report, the State Department says that in Saudi Arabia, "Islam is the official religion, and the law requires that all citizens be Muslims."

"The government prohibits the public practice of non-Muslim religions," the report states.

The Saudis have recognized the right of non-Muslims to worship in private homes, notes the State Department, "but do not always respect this right in practice."

Critics say officials fear the U.S. might jeopardize its tenuous relationship with Riyadh, which recently agreed to allow the use of its air bases for a possible war with Iraq.

But Shea argues that the law – established by the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act – takes into account diplomatic considerations.

"There is a dichotomy between being put on the list and the foreign policy response," explained Shea, director of the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House in Washington, D.C. "The policy response to countries making that list is very flexible and broad. The U.S. doesn't have to slap a trade embargo on Saudi Arabia."

USCIRF spokesperson Anne Johnson told WND that the law essentially calls for the commission to examine treatment of religious believers in a country and tell the administration "whether or not there are problems."

"The State Department has already said there is no religious freedom in Saudi Arabia," she said. "It would seem logical that they would take the next step."

When the commission recommended Saudi Arabia last September, it pointed out that the country "vigorously prohibits all forms of public religious expression other than the government's interpretation and presentation of Sunni Islam."

Others recommended as "countries of particular concern" by the USCIRF were Burma, North Korea, India, Iran, Iraq, Laos, Pakistan, China, Sudan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam.

In Saudi Arabia, the commission said, numerous foreign Christian workers have been "detained, arrested, tortured, and subsequently deported. Shi'a clerics and religious scholars are detained and imprisoned for their religious views, which differ from those of the government."

The commission charged that the "Saudi government's severe violations of religious freedom include torture and cruel and degrading treatment or punishment; prolonged detention without charges; and flagrant denials of the right to liberty and security of the person, including coercive measures directed against women and the extended jurisdiction of the religious police, who exercise their vague powers in ways that violate others' religious freedom."

USCIRF commissioner Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention told White House aides that having Saudi Arabia on the State Department list is a high-priority item for evangelical Christians, according to Newsweek.

The commission was briefed last fall by human-rights groups and religious dissidents who described how the Saudi religious police raided the homes of foreign Christian workers and threw them into overcrowded prisons with squalid conditions, the magazine reported.

"It’s unthinkable to me that our government is not pressing the Saudis on this," said Land

As WorldNetDaily reported last year, three Ethiopian Christians detained without charge were severely beaten and tormented under the authority of a Saudi prison official in Jeddah.

"Being suspended with chains, each of us were flogged 80 times with a flexible metal cable and also severely kicked and beaten with anything that came into their hands," said a letter from the Ethiopians.

The Christians were among 14 foreigners arrested after reports of their participation in gatherings that included Saudi converts to Christianity. Saudi law applies the death penalty to citizens who choose to abandon Islam. None of the Christians were formally charged, however.

Some religious believers in the desert kingdom have suffered the ultimate punishment.

In 1997, two Filipino Catholics involved in Bible studies and prayers in a Saudi prison were beheaded by sword. The men had been accused of "forced armed robbery," but defenders claim they were incarcerated on false charges.

I've heard that converts to other religions can be executed in Saudi Arabia. Is this true?

Yes. The Quran states that crucifiction is the penalty, although I think the saudis are beheading people now.

4 posted on 03/03/2003 9:02:21 PM PST by sheik yerbouty

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I've heard that converts to other religions can be executed in Saudi Arabia. Is this true?

Yes.

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