Somehow the celebration of diversity is only ever incumbent upon Western countries, never those of the Islamic world.
“Algeria Must Guarantee Freedom of Religion & Association for All,” European Centre for Law and Justice, July 2, 2024:
On July 2, 2024, the European Centre for Law and Justice organized a conference at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva to plead the cause of Algerian Christians, persecuted for their faith by the Algerian government. Speakers at the conference included the former French Ambassador to Algeria, Xavier Driencourt, the UN Special Rapporteurs on Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Association, and the Vice-President of the Église Protestante d’Algérie (EPA).
We also feature two exclusive interviews, one with Ambassador Xavier Driencourt and the other with Pastor Youssef Ourahmane on the situation of Christians in Algeria.
Several diplomatic missions to the United Nations showed particular interest in this cause, including representatives from Belgium, the USA, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland. The conference was co-organized with the Jubilee Campaign, an NGO which also defends persecuted Christians.
In Algeria, restrictions on freedom of peaceful assembly and association deprive Christians of the freedom to express and exercise their faith.
Algeria has around 144,000 Christians out of a total population of 46 million. The majority of these Christians are of Algerian nationality and have converted to Christianity in recent decades.
While the Algerian Constitution guarantees freedom of expression in principle, Algerian law criminally condemns anything that may tend to “convert a Muslim to another religion” or to “shake the faith of a Muslim.”[1] As for freedom of conscience, this was removed from the Constitution in 2020.[2]
Finally, legislation on associations and the exercise of non-Muslim religions is applied arbitrarily. The Algerian authorities no longer grant religious association status to evangelical churches. They no longer recognize their places of worship and close them down abusively.
As a result, today, forty-three of the forty-seven churches of the Protestant Church of Algeria are closed, and at least eighteen Christians are facing prison sentences[3] because of their religion. One of these Christians is the Protestant Church of Algeria’s vice-president, Pastor Youssef Ourahmane, who was sentenced on appeal on May 2, 2024, to one year in prison, six months suspended, and 100,000 dinars in fines for having celebrated an unauthorized worship service. The ECLJ rallied to his support (see the article in Le Figaro).[4] As his last resort, he is awaiting trial at the Supreme Court.
The Catholic Church, whose faithful are overwhelmingly foreign and of sub-Saharan origin, also suffers from these restrictions, which force it to maintain the utmost discretion and prevent it from openly proclaiming the Gospel. All Catholics who proselytize in any way are liable to criminal prosecution and deportation if they are not Algerian nationals. The Catholic Church was reduced to witnessing only through charity. However, since the Algerian government has imposed the closure of the Caritas Algeria organization on October 1, 2022, this is now also forbidden. Jean-Paul Vesco, Archbishop of Algiers, has said he does not want to “come into conflict with the authorities” and wanted to “continue to do good without making noise.”[5]…
Nabil Bissada says
The Koran and the sharia law are teaching the Muslims if you are majorities do not respect the freedom of religion, speech, human rights, democracy with the minorities.
But if the Muslims are minorities the Koran and the sharia law teach them to ask the majorities to respect the freedom of religion, speech, human rights and democracy.
Western countries must deal with Muslims same way they are dealing with them. If they close churches close for them their Mosques.
Muslims will start to respect the western countries who accepting them as a refugee. Only if we deal with them the same way their Muslims countries are dealing with them, no freedom, no human rights, no democracy. Either that they will continue to do every kind of trouble by giving us hard life with no secure
rubiconcrest says
True Nabil. In a sane world the US would not accept any refugee or immigrant from Muslim lands unless minority religions were treated the same as majority ones. That won’t happen. So the only solution is to require annual payments from Muslim countries for each of their citizens wishing to immigrate including any children they bring or choose to have in the US. Maybe if they start to go bankrupt they will change.
tim gallagher says
islam is, without a doubt, the most intolerant, foulest load of barbaric shit among still existing religious ideologies. In the western world, we are far too nice and tolerant towards islam and its followers. Hungary shows the right way to deal with intolerant, stinking islam. Slam the door on letting Muslims invade our countries. Muslims, with their intolerance towards non-Muslims when they have power, show that they are unfit to have as citizens in civilised western countries. islam has no golden rule and nothing but hatred towards non-Muslims and that seems as if it will never change.
aum says
Media in the west need to highlight this issue more often.
OLD GUY says
This is what you get when you let Muslim/islamic rule take over your country.
Scotsman48 says
However when that wee Popey fellow in Rome heard about this he said………