Last week in Parliament, Richard attended the launch of Open Doors’ 2023 World Watch List.
The World Watch List is an annual report prepared and published by the World Watch Research team of Open Doors. It ranks the 50 countries where it is most difficult to profess and practice the Christian faith.
The research team surveys religious freedom for Christians into five areas: private life, family life, community life, national life and church life. Separately, they also measure violence against Christians. More information about their methodology in calculating the list can be found here.
Richard Fuller MP said:
Sadly another year when the excellent team at Open Doors who prepare the World Watch List on religious persecution across the globe painted a grim picture.
Opening the meeting, Henrietta Blyth from Open Doors spoke movingly of the importance of religious freedom and her fears that certain states - such as China and Russia - were seeking to replace the basis of global human rights with a new order based on compliance with the state. She reminded us that two thousand years ago, Jesus Christ was condemned and executed under anti blasphemy laws and drew a parallel to the efforts by some governments today to use similar laws to persecute people of faith.
She had three asks of MPs:
1) make sure that freedom of religion is considered in the context of trade negotiations,
2) ensure U.K. programmes that support vulnerable people around the world include those who are vulnerable because of their faith, and
3) to provide a statutory basis for the work of the Prime Minister’s Envoy on Religious Freedom.
Richard also heard from persecuted Christians from North Korea, East Africa and India. The full World Watch List for 2023 can be viewed here.
