Miles Windsor, Senior Manager for Strategy and Campaigns with RFI’s Middle East Action Team, authored an article recently published in Newsweek on the importance of the United Kingdom’s leadership, and continued partnership with the United States, on international religious freedom (IRF).  

As evident in the current struggles in Afghanistan under Taliban rule, Windsor notes that religion continues to be central to political, economic, and military affairs around the world. Religious intolerance undermines pluralism and stability, which is why IRF efforts of these two allies are vital 

[Religious intolerance] is a poison, not just polluting far-off, tumultuous nations, but spreading and contaminating throughout the world… Western governments must be making every effort to advance religious freedom and challenge abuses of this fundamental human right. The U.S. government has shown unparalleled leadership on this cause for the past 25 years. However, the United Kingdom has steadily emerged as an important partner to the U.S. in this endeavor.

Windsor cites a variety of notable religious freedom developments in the United Kingdom over the past decade. First, he highlights the appointment of a prime minister’s special envoy for religious freedom or belief. Second, he shares that the U.K. foreign secretary launched a 2019 inquiry into foreign support for persecuted Christians around the world, and notes the commitment of successive governments to implement 22 recommendations from the findings of the report produced from that inquiry. Third, he points to the 2020 co-founding of the International Freedom of Religion or Belief Alliance (IRBA). Lastly, Windsor directs readers’ attention to the commitment of the United Kingdom to host the Ministerial to Advance Religious freedom in 2022 (building on the work of three prior Ministerials convened in 2018, 2019, and 2020).

While these positive developments are notable, Windsor encourages government leaders and IRF advocates to ask, “Where do we go from here?” He continues:

There are many countries in which the U.K. could leverage its influence to dislodge broken policies and attitudes, and empower those nations and their citizens. However, there are threats to U.K. engagement and leadership emanating from within the corridors of Whitehall. For the U.K. government to continue to wield its soft power and influence around the world, they need diplomats who ‘do religion.’ Policy must be shaped by those who understand the centrality of religious identity in geopolitical dynamics throughout most of the world… because doing so is right and good for humanity and their country’s own strategic objectives.

Windsor argues that U.K. civil society organizations (CSOs), in addition to the U.K. government, must also ask the question of how to progress and achieve more. For example, he suggests that they direct political engagement and research toward a broader strategy that enables real change. Windsor also urges them to adopt new methods to improve the quality and quantity of their data to strengthen their case. 

He concludes that while the religious freedom space is replete with extraordinarily capable and experienced people, “We need to identify new and effective strategies together. And we need to renew our resolve. If we are going to stand a chance against the latest generation of tyranny, the U.K. can and must lead the way on religious freedom.”