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Turkey ‘highly' restrictive on religious freedom
The report, titled “Global Restrictions on Religion” and released Wednesday, finds that 64 nations -- about one-third of the countries in the world -- have “high” or “very high” restrictions on religion. But because some of the most restrictive countries are very populous, nearly 70 percent of the world's 6.8 billion people live in countries with high restrictions on religion, the brunt of which often falls on religious minorities. US allies Saudi Arabia and Egypt are among 10 mostly Muslim nations whose governments impose the most curbs on religion, according to the report.
Afghanistan’s government also ranked poorly, highlighting a potentially sensitive diplomatic flashpoint as President Barack Obama sends more US troops to the Central Asian country to quell a growing insurgency. Switzerland, which recently banned the construction of minarets, on the other hand, was listed among countries where there are “low” restrictions on religious freedoms.
The report ranked countries by two measures: government restrictions on religion and restrictions from violence or intimidation by private individuals or groups. Saudi Arabia was the only country to rank “very high” in both measures.
Both lists rank 198 countries worldwide and are based on scales of 0-10. The rankings fall under four categories: “Very High,” “High,” “Moderate” and “Low.”
The first index ranked 10 mostly Muslim countries as having “very high” restrictions on religion. It also included China and mostly Buddhist Myanmar.
According to the same index, Turkey is ranked among 33 countries where government restrictions on religion are “high.” Russia, Greece, Bulgaria and Belarus are also in the same group.
“But the list of countries with high restrictions also contains some that are widely seen as democratic, such as Turkey and Israel. Israel’s score is driven up by security policies that sometimes have the effect of limiting access to religious sites, and by its preferential treatment of Orthodox Jews. The government recognizes only Orthodox Jewish religious authorities in some personal status matters [such as marriage] concerning Jews and devotes the bulk of state funds provided for religion to Orthodox Jews, even though they make up only a small portion of all Jews in Israel. Among the factors in Turkey’s score is that millions of Alevi Muslims, a minority whose beliefs and practices differ in significant ways from Sunni Islam, are required to receive Sunni Muslim religious instruction in state schools. During the period studied, Alevis had numerous court cases pending against the Ministry of Education regarding forced religious instruction,” the Pew Forum said in its analysis of the Government Restrictions Index (GRI).
The GRI is based on 20 questions used by the Pew Forum to assess state curbs on religion at the national, provincial and local levels.
“Is public preaching by religious groups limited by any level of government?” and “Taken together, how do the constitution/basic law and other national laws and policies affect religious freedom?” are among the questions asked.
By region, the Middle East and North Africa were the most restrictive, while the Americas were the least. The governments of sub-Saharan Africa were ranked less restrictive than those of Europe, the report said.
“The relatively high government restrictions score for Europe’s 45 countries is due in part to former communist countries, such as Russia, which have replaced state atheism with state-favored religions that are accorded special protections or privileges,” the report said.
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