Religious freedom has deteriorated “significantly” in India under the Hindunationalist government, a US commission said Monday as it again recommendedtargeted sanctions over abuses.
It was the third straight year that the US Commission on InternationalReligious Freedom asked that India be placed on a list of “countries ofparticular concern” — a recommendation that has angered New Delhi and isvirtually certain to be dismissed by the State Department.
In an annual report, the panel — which is appointed to offerrecommendations but does not set US policy — voiced wide concern aboutSouth Asia and also backed the State Department’s inclusion of Pakistan onthe blacklist.
In India, the commission pointed to “numerous” attacks on religiousminorities, particularly Muslims and Christians, in 2021 as Prime MinisterNarendra Modi’s government promoted “its ideological vision of a Hindustate” through policies hostile to minorities.
“Religious freedom conditions in India significantly worsened,” the reportsaid.
It pointed to a “culture of impunity for nationwide campaigns of threatsand violence by mobs and vigilante groups” and arrests of journalists andhuman rights advocates.
In a shift from the past two years, no one on the panel dissented from therecommendation on India, commissioner Anurima Bhargava told reporters.
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The Indian government in previous years has angrily rejected thecommission’s findings, accusing it of bias.
President Joe Biden, like Donald Trump before him, has sought to increaseties with India, seeing common cause in the face of a rising China.
Biden is expected to meet Modi next month in Tokyo as part of a four-waysummit of the “Quad” with Japan and Australia.
The commission also recommended adding Afghanistan to the blacklistfollowing the triumph of the Taliban and relisting Nigeria, which wasremoved by the Biden administration.
The countries on the State Department’s religious freedom blacklist, whichcan trigger sanctions, are China, Eritrea, Iran, Myanmar, North Korea,Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. – APP/AFP
