Her husband, Tony Ortega – best known as a fierce opponent of religions, with a particular ‘penchant’ for Scientology – has made headlines in the US – or rather, caused a scandal – for becoming a staunch defender of paedophiles and child trafficking.
Our sister organization CAP Liberté de Conscience, together with Human Rights Without Frontiers and International Support for Human Rights, has once again defended the minority Islamic religious group Ahmadiyya Peace and Light (AROPL) in a written statement to the Human Rights Council. AROPL members are subjected to serious acts of intolerance and violence by the Orthodox Muslim community and the Egyptian authorities.
The much-vaunted freedom of the web is not so free after all, as evidenced by the European Chat Control bill to “monitor” its citizens' chats. In Nigeria, where Sharia law is rigidly enforced, sharing a song on WhatsApp that contains opinions about the prophet Mohammed, opinions not shared by Muslims who follow Sharia law, results in a death sentence by public hanging, as a warning to blasphemers.
A “prophet,” whose revelations come from hallucinogenic plants, believes CESNUR funds AROPL as part of a Jewish “Sabbatian-Frankist” conspiracy.
In this article, Rosita Šorytė denounces the activities of one of the leaders of the New Age Anti-Cultism, Wahid Azal, whose “sources” derive from hallucinogenic plants. Wahid Azal has incorporated ayahuasca and Haoma – a MAO inhibitor from Syrian rue (Peganum harmala) and Australian acacia bark containing DMT – into his religious practice, which allows him to communicate with mythical figures from centuries past.
FOB has addressed the topic of apostates several times, including the study "Apostates and New Religious Movements" by Bryan Ronald Wilson, Emeritus Fellow, University of Oxford, and the article "The Defector's Syndrome" by attorney Fabrizio d'Agostini, founding member of FOB. The following article, by Willy Fautré, director of Human Rights Without Frontiers, exemplifies a typical modus operandi in the anti-cult world ...
Washington D.C. – The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) strongly condemns increasing attacks against members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community in Pakistan. On May 16, Dr. Sheik Mahmood, an Ahmadi Muslim man, was shot and killed in Sargodha. Earlier this month, on Sunday, May 11, Tahir Mahmood and Ijaz Hussain, both Ahmadi Muslim men, were arrested in Karachi for offering Friday prayers. During their court appearance on May 12, both men were violently dragged from the courtroom and assaulted by mobs, resulting in the death of Tahir Mahmood.
Our partner CAP Liberté de Conscience, which has always been at the forefront in denouncing violations of freedom of belief that affect religious minorities, published an article, which we republish below, in which it stigmatises the connivance between the Pakistani police and the extremist zelot group Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) in the use of violence against Ahmadiyya Muslim communities, their places of worship and even the graves in their cemeteries. The role of social media in spreading hate speech against Ahmadiyya Muslims is also denounced.
The International Human Rights Desk (IHRD) of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in the UK reports that at around 1.30pm on 28 February members of the Tehreek-e-Labaik (TLP) extremist group stormed an Ahmadiyya place of worship in Daska, Sialkot District, chanting anti-Ahmadi slogans at a group of Ahmadis who had gathered for Friday prayers. Police were called to the mosque, however they proceeded to arrest 23 of the Ahmadis who were present, including three minors aged 11, 14 and 17.
In January 2023, Danish lawyer and politician Ramus Paludan, founder and leader of the far-right Stram Kurs party with strong anti-Islamic connotations, burned a copy of the Quran in front of the Turkish embassy in Stockholm, creating a diplomatic incident between Sweden and Turkey. Again, in 2023, Iraqi-born immigrant Salwan Momika publicly set Qurans on fire. Two years later, Momika was gunned down last Jan. 29 to “avenge” such burnings, increasingly inflaming the tempers of opposing factions. And what will tolerant Sweden do about it?
In this interview published by VaticanNews, Father Jens Petzold bears witness to a path of active pursuit of inter-religious coexistence between Muslim and Christians. Father Petzold's admirable philosophy can be encapsulated in his sentence: ‘Drinking tea together is probably much more effective for peacebuilding than having long discussions about human rights’.
by CAP Liberté de Conscience — The International Human Rights Committee (IHRC) in association with CAP Liberté de Conscience has continued to draw the world’s attention to the severe persecution of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in Pakistan.
by Bitter Winter — Note: In publishing this appeal, “Bitter Winter” notes the historic importance of Moorish Science to African-American culture. It is one of the religions established by people of color during the Great Migration, and stands as a historic emblem of one stage in the long march to empowerment of Black people. Because it is a Black religion, Moorish Science has always provoked hostilities in the white-majority American population, but we all have a collective social duty to see that religious freedom is not circumscribed by racism.
Washington, DC — On August 7, 2024 the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today released the following new report: Afghanistan Country Update - This country update describes current religious freedom conditions under de facto Taliban authorities, including the introduction and enforcement of strict religious edicts.
The incidents of intolerance against the Ahmadi Religion of Peace and Light (AROPL), a New Islamic Religious Movement opposed in Muslim-majority countries such as Azerbaijan and Turkey, but also in unsuspected human rights champions such as Sweden, continue. Human Rights Without Frontiers' director Willy Fautré reports in an article reproduced below that in Azerbaijan there have been arrests among AROPL worshippers for being guilty of peacefully expressing their faith in public.
How to prevent such an outcome? Human rights NGOs are calling on the Turkish authorities to follow their recommendations
In May 2023, the story of the 104 refugees of the Ahmadi Religion of Peace and Light (AROPL) who presented themselves at the Turkish side of the Kapikule border seeking access to asylum in Bulgaria, but were blocked and beaten by the Turkish police, became international news.
We had already stigmatised the persecution carried out in Sweden against the Ahmadi Religion of Peace and Light, a peaceful religious minority that follows the teachings of the Koran, but with beliefs that differ from those of traditional Islam and, therefore, harassed and persecuted.
Ban on visible symbols of belief in the official education system of the Flemish Community not incompatible with Article 9 of the Convention
Registrar of the European Court (16.05.2024) - In its decision in the case of Mikyas and Others v. Belgium (application no. 50681/20) the European Court of Human Rights has, by a majority, declared the application inadmissible. The decision is final.
While France, through the government agency MIVILUDES, is targeting the followers of MISA Yoga and its spiritual leader Gregorian Bivolaru, Sweden, which has always been seen as a vanguard of tolerance, inclusiveness and human rights, has unexpectedly engaged in persecution of a new Muslim religious movement, the Ahmadi Religion of Peace and Light. The director of Human Rights Without Frontiers, Willy Fautré gave a detailed account of this, which we publish below.
A public school’s decision to give its students (many of whom are Muslims) a day off for Eid al Fitr has generated unnecessary controversies.
By Alessandro Amicarelli — On March 17, 1861, with the proclamation made in Turin of the newly established Kingdom of Italy, the result of the annexation of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies to the Kingdom of Sardinia, the first phase of united Italy began. It was a new sovereign state with the House of Savoy at its head and the Roman Catholic religion as the state religion.
On March 9, 2024, in London, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at (AMJ) hosted the 18th National Peace Symposium. Among the many guests were Alessandro Amicarelli, Chairman of FOB, and Marco Respinti, member of FOB's Advisory Council and editor-in-chief of the academic publication The Journal of CESNUR (Center for Studies on New Religions) and the CESNUR project Bitter Winter: A Magazine on Religious Liberty and Human Rights.
