>> this seems to be, when i hear that kerry would have done this kind of thing, that we don't want to confront, counterproductive, but you are suggesting that confrontation

is, in fact, the way to deal with these kind of issues. is that her? >> let's be clear we're not talking military confrontation year. but if there was a hiker as there has been abducted in iran, the state department has no hesitancy to come out and make the major issues of the case. but it seems like when christians are involved, there is, they shy away. another example of this, and it is found in both republican and democratic administrations on some very key issues, bush on iraq, but in 2010 there was the last turkey in afghanistan was shut down by the karzai government, or it was a 99 year lease council by a court. and that was the last winning

church in afghanistan. our diplomatic our defense contractors now have to go and hide their worship behind a walled compound. afghanistan, while the surge was going on, over 100,000 american troops on the ground, joined saudi arabia as the only other country in the world that became so intolerant they did not have a single church. the obama administration knew about it and actually reported about in the state department religious freedom, which is still the gold standard for human rights reporting. but at the time it was happening they said nothing and did nothing. so on our watch this has happened. the bush administration, two-thirds of the christians in iraq were driven out. we have it in the book about conversations we had about secretary rice at the time

saying please protecting. again, we had 100,000 troops on thground and she said no, we cannot get involved. it's sectarian here. meanwhile, the united states had just installed a shiite government in iraq and was negotiating on the path of sunni leaders to get sunni appointments in the government. so it just rang true. >> it does seem as i listen because i'm being educated on this, some rights are more equal than others, right? in other words, if we're talking about universal concept or standard of let's say women's rights, then we can speak out against them. but it seems like there's been a shining a we're doing that with regard to religious liberty, that we are at least it seems to me at least the current administration, but some extent the previous administration is willing to throw this under the bus for what they perceive as the greater good of peace. but it sounds like it's not working? >> i think that's happening. for a while president obama and

secretary of state clinton got into the habit of using the expression freedom of worship, which would be about 10% freedom of religion, most of religion involves other thing other than worship. there was enough criticism they stopped. another rhetorical device is speak about religious toleration, which is why can't we all get along? i like religious toleration but it's not to say the same as religious freedom. religious freedom is the legal right to do certain things, even if you do happen to be intolerant. so there's an attempt to sort of redefined issue, but it's certainly not given the centrality it deserves. one important thing we want to emphasize, lela mentioned the

book we had called "silenced." and one of the main things there, we looked of blasphemy codes in the muslim world and make the point that this stifles debate within islam that empowers the radical. because liberal muslims by which liberal in this context i remain committed to freedom don't condemn. it goes the other way around. so freedom loving muslims are the ones who are silenced. if you want good things to come out of say, the arab spring come you can't have the sort of blasphemy codes going around which cut down debate. that's a religious freedom issue. the pew forum have done studies on the status of women, economic development, militarization, and it all has a strong and positive effects. there's a very good correlation.

goes both ways. so there's also, religion is regarded something on the site. it's what you do on sunday. but if you don't have religious freedom, you will not have democratic development in any country in the world. >> i want to just touch on that, that this difference between freedom of worship and freedom of religion, i recently spoke about that. i don't know mistake about this subject, but there is as you said a tremendous difference. it's almost laughable to use them interchangeably. i know that hillary clinton infamously something like 18 months ago was talking about freedom of worship, and chuck colson, the late chuck colson noticed this and begin to speak out against it. it's when i got involved in these issues, and i think, my goodness, this is a chilling thing because freedom of worship, their freedom of

worship in china, they have freedom of worship and the third reich. freedom of worship is laughable. imager can go a little building and do your little rituals but the moment to come out of the building after your 90 minutes or two hours, you belong to us and you are, whatever it is you believe, must bow to the secular or of the orthodoxy of the state. so that's a lack of religious freedom, and it's important i think for both who don't know and again i did not really until recently but this idea of religious freedom which is at the heart of the ordered freedoms of america is the kind, it's the kind of freedom that must be expressed outside of the place for one worships. in other words, that has to do with the ideas and koch's. it is a very far cry from genuine religious freedom. so i just want to thank you for making a point and want to underscore. that i think against those of us who only have come to this recently don't realize that freedom of worship is

practically meaningless. those are weasel words if i've ever heard of them. >> one of the issues that immediately comes to mind is what we used to call witnessing as christians or evangelizing. and has become a dirty word. it's also in many muslim countries and also in china i believe, to trying to spread christianity, which is one of the tenets of the gospel, the call to spread the word. and, therefore, does not fall into the category of religious freedom. that word has become a dirty word even if. >> what we christians called sharing the good news. >> it's actually a basic human right. and the u.n. to its credit put out a very important report on this very subject about how it is a grave human rights concerns that evangelizing is now

repressed in so many countries. >> it's a free speech issue. >> it's a religious freedom issue. you and special rapporteur on religion says it is socially to the heart of religious freedom, to be able to talk about your belief to others, and to each other about your beliefs. so that it's a free speech, freedom of association issue and it's a freedom of religion. >> since we're talking specifically about this widespread and increased persecution of christians around the world, let me ask this question. why isn't the american church or the western church, but specifically american church speaking out about this issue, or are they? >> certainly some members of the church are speaking out about this. they're very dedicated organizations to work on this. and there are congregations that work on this. but i would say compared to 15

years ago, there's much less attention to this issue in the american church's. people very quickly want to become introverted, introverted within, about the situation within the united states. particularly if i'm doing call-in radio on this issue, one of the first calls is always good to be, yeah, but what about in america as well? my reply is the problem is they deserve attention. but whatever shall i want i can say, but i don't there's a program that gives with that a lot. don't deal with what i'm talking about. so i just want to focus on that. that's important. >> even in the churches. political correctness. [talking over each other] again, this misguided multiculturalism, we don't want to insult anybody and don't want

to be unpleasant. we want to get along. something that's a big part of it. >> okay. this leaves at least me and inevitably to to unpleasant words, dennis rodman. or maybe i can swap out north korea. you and your book and other places have talked about the horrors of north korea. wh the generally misguided dennis rodman, misguidedly in my estimation went over there, i thought two things. i thought that this is like jane fonda sitting on the guns. and i would love to be corrected on this, but it struck me that this was a way to prop up a murderous regime committing some of the worst atrocities along the lines, which are described in your book. what is your perception of that?

and do you think that our state department could've done it again to prevent his company knew about this? because i, frankly, was so stunned, especially since it was north korea. there are gray areas and then there's north korea. what do you all think about that and what do you think of the role one place and doing things like that? i mean, reaching out in that way to me as i said misguided, naïve. what you think lex can anything good come of this? >> let me comment first of the situation of north korea and then i will defer to my co-panelists to say what you do about it. north korea is probably the worst place to be any number of things, being a human being is probably the worst. but it's probably also the worst place to be a christian. persecution is the most intensive. i just want to go back to north korea, use that info to the commonest post-conflict world.

north korea standing out on its own, and then the old post-soviet countries. there's widespread persecution in these countries, too. in terms of phone numbers that affects more christians than in the muslim world. so that's another huge patent in which we look at. but very currently say that north korea stands on its own. >> i don't have insights into dennis rodman. >> who need it doesn't dennis rodman. [laughter] >> people, we have cases that we discussed in a book about north koreans being shot summarily executed for being found in possession of the bible.

families to three generations in the detention camp system because they have been revealed to be christians. it is the worst, repressive country in the world. then you have only five churches there. as one of our cases said, they are all fake. they are there for western benefit. it is there to fool the west. but, you know, this is going on in china, to a lesser extent, but they've moved to a more regulatory system. it puts, as countries become more involved in international trade, they become more self-conscious about human rights, if they take, they don't use, we are not seeing so much the brutal methods as we've seen in the past. in a place like china, pastors and priests may be put in work

camps but they also are just as likely to be put under, into retirement homes for detention, a kind of house arrest. in vietnam, they are still bulldozing monasteries and churches in graveyards to put in a good tourism resorts. and get particularly brutal in the outlying areas where the international media is not present along among people in the remote tribal area. dennis rodman is one way that they are trying, whatever dennis rodman was thinking, we will never know, what the north koreans were thinking, what pyongyang was thinking is we're going to use this guide to fool the west, as they speak i would say not only to fool the west, i think of the corollary, the

soviet union, when somebody would go over there and have a photo op, that is served to prop up the regime. and my understanding is that prisoners in the gulags would suffer when that happened, when someone would speak out heroically, as reagan did a couple of times, their situation would improve. so it seems to me that rodman was used, but i guess another question, just because i'm interested in our own administration, our own government's role, what did not have known he was going over there? what did not have at least had to give some tacit approval to this? getting up there? i was just stunned that this could even occur. >> you have to have a visa. i don't know. i don't know how he went, what he went through china or some other third country. i really don't have any insight.

>> can you make something of? >> it happened after the book was written, eric, so we haven't done her research on dennis rodman. >> if the north koreans that they could use dennis rodman has become it backfired. this is the regime, -- dennis rodman is not the guy who is going to represent the west. but how he got in, whatever, i don't know. >> i think it might be worth pointing out, because the talked a lot about islam, why the commonest countries persecute christians. and what we've talked about and the past on the subject is christians bow to a higher authority. and although this is not religious, on malicious persecution, a guide on the plane said to me, religion is responsible for all of her time

in the world come all the worst in the world. we need to get rid of religion. this is a common statement. these countries are not religious. their anti-religious because christians will not bow to a lesser god. and i think that's why we have to remember that we are dealing with atheism of the sort. it sort of becomes religious in its own way, but it is atheism. but it is so threatened by christians and other people of faith that they strike out just as violently as if it were a religion. >> i think we're supposed to transition to audience questions. who has the timing on that? i think we are, is that right quick -- is that right? we're only going to be true and false questions, please. let me ask one final question, actually made i will say that to the end.

all right, so if anybody who's got a question, you have to limited to 14 syllables. >> and wait for the microphone. >> is there a microphone being passed around the? >> and please identify yourself. >> the microphone will be moved. here it comes. and if you don't mind, actually we do have a serious role. please bring your question in the form of a question. there is a gentleman here who had his hand up. know, right there. you just have to. the man with his hand up. thank you. don't have. >> [inaudible]

>> going back to iran for just a minute, and pastor abedini to in libya we have an american in jail for proselytizing ezell, an american citizen but he was arrested with south african, six others. there's nothing from the state department nor will there be anything from the state department because, and this is a question, are we or are we not doing this mean in any routine that we have with the soviet union that we take iran up, we're only can you talk about persecution of christians in iran? nowhere else, because we feel te libya and egypt and all the other muslim brotherhood controlled nations, am i want to do whether they arrest americans or not, that's okay because they are against iran. we are in our main enemy routine the way we were in the soviet union when the arm of again. >> i think that was more than 14

syllables but we will let ago. thank you. >> that was what was so mystifying about secretary kerry's statement, where it didn't imagine fact that he was christian or that he was being sentenced essentially for proselytizing. even if iran is the main hostile force, we are not even willing to speak up really much there either. so i wouldn't even go that far, as far as you've gone. >> there is that patent i think of going easy on our friends are people who want to be our friends so that tends to be more concentration, say, on iran. so that's outspoken on afghanistan, about what happens there. >> you mentioned egypt earlier. >> just to mention i like him so much ago an egyptian court sentenced several americans to death in connection to the movie

trailer thing. that included pastor jones was not one of my favorite people. but when foreign courts are condemning americans to death for exercising their first amendment rights within the united states, i think they should be some comment about that. >> microphone to the front row, possibly. here it comes. stack my name is fred weber. true or false -- [laughter] the dramatic rise in the persecution of christians worldwide but especially in the muslim countries is a direct result of the rise in opposition to our country, to the anti-american feeling that's been crescendoing, especially in this past decade. >> i'm not sure that's the case. within the muslim world i think so that is connected, with

radical islam, if you go through al qaeda statements for things of this kind, then you will see america is hated because it's thought to be christian. christians are not hated because they're thought to be americans. they see the world in religious terms. bin laden says the buddhas have a seat on the u.n. security council, why can't we? what's he referring to? he's referring to china. so they put them, everything is put in religious categories. so christians would be seen as a problem anyway. just add another, 60 or 70 countries in the book, don't want to get down into the weeds of each individual country but most of the rise is in the muslim world. but increasing attacks in sri lanka, since the end of the sri lankan civil war. thankfully that is over, but that also means that the

government is nothing more confident and attacks on religious minority, muslims and christians, have increased. so you see there are problems elsewhere, but the big increases are in the muslim world. >> and while the microphone is moving, when did we lose c-span? at 15 after or at 30 after? does anybody know? that's what i thought, thank you. proceed to a raised hand. i will leave it to you. thank you. >> nation. recently, our organization in egypt one official government registration after an eight year process with a lot of back and forth. at one point the egyptian media reported that registration had been denied as well as to others like the carter center for both threats to national sovereignty. so that the preface. now to a 14 syllable question, which is, what come in

situations like egypt where there is a strong phobia about foreign money, foreign political influence, how do we work without exposing indigenous christians as we've seen even among our indigenous staff to charges of being foreign spies, working for anti-national political interests? >> well, i'll take a stab at that. i think the key, the operative phrase is foreign money. in other words, u.s. money. i mean, we are basically about, we are promising egypt's government upwards of $10 billion either through our direct aid, military aid, economic aid, debt forgiveness, $2 billion debt forgiveness, approval for imf loans worth about $5 billion right there.

so the egyptian government is not at all adverse to foreign money. it's just adverse, it wants its for itself and not for anyone else in civic society. we have to use our leverage. we have to put some conditions on our foreign aid. to protect the rights of minorities, to protect human rights, and to promote our interest in egypt, such as flourishing of real democracy, a liberal democracy, and a strong civic society. that's the only way that, you know, the other interesting thing about paul had mentioned the correlations between women's rights and religious freedom and so forth. there's also the converse is true. when there is religious repression and restrictions, there is instability. and q. has documented this. so it's in our own national

interest not just our ideals to have, to ensure that a country respect the rights of its national citizens. so i think that the answer is that we have to start making clear that we expect religious freedom and protection for the copts and protection for human rights in general with our generous aid. >> just add to that in terms of, with the egyptian ngos of all kinds. so lots of american money goes into egypt but the government wants it all, and has cut off others. the second thing is there's lots of foreign money going into egypt from the gulf. and that's very, i haven't seen any documentation of that, but all the reliable people i know say it is the case. so it's only certain types of

money. of course, that doesn't help an ngo if it runs afoul of laws on foreign money. i think the main thing would be what does the organization itself want? the democracy and human rights activist in egypt was company on this a year or two back and said, ask of the organization. it's probably the best judge of its own risks and what it needs. so that's all i can suggest on that. >> i'm with the investigative project on terrorism to our organization tracks domestic islamists that are filled with the rugged such as the council -- islamic society of north america and we've been able to see if there's been a close correlation between these groups and lobbying the obama administration.

it come out and support the brotherhood in egypt and elsewhere in the middle east. do you think that they are having an impact on how the administration deals with indigenous christians in the muslim world? >> quick canvass. we would have no idea on, you know, what are the dynamics, just observe the phenomenon, the current administration, with the bush administration as far as are doing with iraq did not raise this issue, did not focus on the persecution of christians. so i think there are many dynamics joining one of sort of political practice whereby the u.s. and also u.s. doesn't want to be seen as a christian nation simply defending christians. these are how the most opportune how the decision-making goes on, i don't know. >> i think that there's a "blind

spot" in -- also uploaded to this book. about when journalists don't get religion. i think is also a blind speed is executed in the of the only written one book on that subject? [laughter] i'm sorry to hear that. >> there's a blind spot an embassy there and it made a couple obvious missteps recently. one was bringing over a woman that stamp on our staff who is in the back uncovered the fact that she was to get a human rights award, an egyptian national, who had tweeted her congratulations for the attacks on 9/11 against the united states, ma and wanted to see america burn and that kind of thing, but also attacks on israel. and get some celebrating on jihad is a tax. and so when i was in college,

the state department of course was horribly embarrassed and center packing home without the award. on the anniversary of 9/11, last fall, the embassy when the youtube trailer that paul mentioned came out, the embassy put up a statement saying that this was an abuse of freedom of speech. this is the same kind of characterization that egypt's government itself has use for many years and the u.n., that we must not abuse freedom of speech and, therefore, we must have international lastly lost its i think there's a problem coming from that embassy as well. >> if i can just add, nina mentioned this book, "blind spot," and my coeditors was lela gilbert. one of the phenomenal explorers in this is that most journalists with of course many exceptions

don't understand religion. hear on talk about persecution and not talk about christianity alone. it's just in general many have a very secular mindset, which itself is okay, but actually don't really know what goes on outside that bubble. and so there are many things they have missed, they just don't see. so if you're duty with persecution, it can sometimes happen in the capitals of country but also in remote areas. and if you're in the capital talking to other journalists and you're talking to diplomats and other people and that's your world, and often you don't know what's going on in the country you cover. so there's a more general phenomena of journalists missing things. >> yes, emanuel with the campaign. you mentioned that north korea is the worst place in the world

for christians. the world has said that year is the most violent place in the world for christians. now, of course, i imagine you can distinguish between the two because one is based upon certain persecution and the other is -- [inaudible]. but given that nigeria had more christians killed and the rest of the world put together in 2012, could you maybe speak to this end reconcile the two, the difference between the two? thank you. >> you, obviously there are dimensions. you may have noticed we use, said that christians are the most widely persecuted or. that is, persecuted and more countries and involved than any other group in the world but we wouldn't want, i steer clear of saying the most risky because

much of what that means like the highs are more intensive persecuted. it but they're much smaller so it is much less widespread and involves fewer people. similarly, for myself at least when i referred to north korea, as well to come it's the worst place. there is no christian in north korea who is not persecuted. it's there, it's total, its repressive. in nigeria, you have 55, 60 million christians. and as you quickly say, the death toll is in the thousands. this is another area that the state department has been reluctant to speak out on, speak out on some of these issues. so in terms of death down, then more christians are killed in nigeria than anywhere else. we probably should spend more attention on this because it's also one of the largest christian countries in the world, but it's the intensity in

north korea of how many christians -- we don't know how many there are, probably 200,000 everyone of them is persecuted. in nigeria with 60 million there are thousands of deaths, that many christians, they are not facing that. as you know, mainly in the middle health and the north. so that's the way we are using the terms. there are many dimensions of which we can get to the countries. >> and there's no doubt there is horrific persecution in nigeria. last easter of course a series of churches were bombed, full of worshipers, and this just happen happened repeatedly over and over again. i think in june like every sunday we saw a bombing, a church bombing, and then again more recently. so it's just a horrific situation. and again, the link between stability and religious freedom could not be clearer.

the state department should be making this a priority instead of giving speeches as the assistant secretary did after the easter bombing at one of the other think tanks and down saying that this had nothing to do with religion. on it, boko haram is the author of these attacks, the very name means western education is prohibited in a sense. and has made no and has not tried either fact that they want to impose an islamist state on their countries. and really cleanse the area of christians, so-called religious cleansing. >> let me just add that i think jubilee has just issued a report, i got an e-mail. imagined when i put together -- i was in istanbul just last week and document the number of attacks at how many people were killed because it was a lot of confusion on that score. >> faith mcdonnell from the

institute. thank you all for the book and for your moderation, eric. my question is, i'm seeing in my own work the tendency of our government and the media and others to make the perpetrators in to the victims. and i wondered if you could talk about that at all add to that the idea of moral equivalence from which we totally see with boko haram where the state department has chosen to call them victims rather than perpetrators? >> okay, this does happen in the example you've given that often boko haram a tax -- attacks whether or not. there have been religious clashes, deaths on both sides, but boko haram is a terrorist organization, bombing churches almost every sunday.

there's a tendency say, well, it kills muslims as well, which is serving this. it kills traditional muslim league, this attacks the military, the police and the government. but its focus on killing police and other things isn't because they're muslim. it's because they represent the state. so it is attacking the state and christians, and so that gets ms. castor because there are muslim deaths, well, then it's not religious and sectarian clashes. is still goes on a newspaper, and sometimes even state department coverage of egypt. that if there was a conflict, they call it a sec terry and clashed to which my reply is, no, it's a program. that's like calling the ku klux klan in the 19 twice in the south, oh, there were racial clashes in alabama last night, 25 people were killed. it's not.

violence, there may be retaliatory violence but the aggression is going one way. how many have been burned or attacked? to my knowledge zero. broad numbers of churches begin numbers of churches but again i do want to say that all muslims are attacking all christians or anything of this kind, but in terms of the violence it not -- it's not just a clash between two forces. radical islamists, and christians are one of the principal targets. >> one of the cases we talk about in the book is the massacre in october 11, and come in cairo. a group of copts that got together, mostly coptic youth they got together, some muslims, to protest the burning of churches that had been going on with the government failed to come to the rescue or to give them any protection. and the government set out to

break up this protest by opening fire with live ammunition on the protesters and running them over with tanks. and the pictures are up on the internet today. they are just grotesque and horrific. >> when was this? >> this was october 31 of 11 but this was just the beginning of the arab spring. it was the first year of the arab spring. i remember, never forget, how the u.s. government put out a response condemning it and saying that, asking for both sides to refrain from further violence. >> because some of the tanks were damaged. [laughter] >> sam wrote at the time on, he said maybe i should tell the military to stand down from telling the copts and i should tell the copts to stop dying. it's a perfect example of that

phenomenon. >> i just want to ask a question because as i said at seatac, i gave a speech about this, and how we seem to have lost the understanding and american -- cpac. one place where we have this understanding of ordered liberty and how you cannot have so-called democracy or self-government without the protection of religious freedom. and it seems to me that both republicans and democrats have gotten this woefully wrong. you can't just sprinkle democracy dust and to get democracy, if you do not have built-in protection for minorities and religious freedom, and the arab spring quote unquote seems to be a classic example of this, this idea that we're willing to report certain things we can get democracy because we believe democracy will he do all kinds of good things. and the iron is just the opposite, seems to be happening,

that democracy becomes meaningless, it becomes mob rule and that this understanding of the ordered liberty that the founders gave us is so different from what we're talking about. this is sort of faux democracy. >> yet, and i think that we feel that the citizens, the good citizens of america need to speak up at this point, and this is why, go back to your initial question, why did we write the book, we want everyone to know what's going on it because we cannot rely on our political leaders to lead us. we have to lead them at this point. >> what can we do to speak up? >> we need to become informed as americans. we need to use our citizenship to appeal to our political leaders. and we've written this book but we've also want to introduce today, we are unveiling today a

new website called persecutionreports.org, and this website is an aggregator of all the copts stories of religious freedom in the world, and it's going to be updated weekly, it is going to cover all religious groups, not just christians. and it's going to cover the whole world. but it's going to be a resource for the media, resource for the average citizens, a resource for church groups and anybody else, human rights groups to want to know what's happening in the world today regarding persecution. >> did you say that is up-to-date? >> that is just announced right now, breaking news. >> persecutionreports.org. thank you. >> in terms of we can do, the answer is a whole lot. but just one story. nina wrote a book 16 years ago, so did lela at eye on the persecution of christians.

and both of those books if you asked us what's the worst place now, the answer is clear, we are stuck. made a particular focus. there is tremendous lobbying in the united states. by a whole range of groups, but in terms of the number of bodies, most of them were dealing with christians because there are 350,000 congregations in this country, so you can mobilize far more people than say amnesty international can. but particular focus on this event. the bush administration and colin powell said will get rid of this whole idea of special envoy. it messes up the lines of authority in the state department. but against that pressure that was strong lobbying by coalition in the united states to have a special envoy for sudan, which was granted. john did a very good job. there were many other countries involved and i don't just --

those were the central players, those were the largest players. that led to a cease-fire in sudan that laid onto a a referendum and accretion of in this country in the world. so that is quite, create the conditions for a new country. that's another thing, you want everywhere but it shows there's a real focus on this sort of thing. it's amazing what can be skittish and the question, why did that happen? why do you think that this was different from what we are seeing now? >> kind of just add a little footnote to what paul said? the sequel is the state department religious freedom report when it came out last summer noted that south sudan, this place that it's in genocide level of religious persecution had no reports of persecution whatsoever, or note even reports of discrimination, either by the government or by forces within the society.

so that's an amazing transformation. >> what do we think it was in 97 an onboard? what do we think -- >> one of the things we know was the great chuck colson. we have lost him and others would've lost as well. dozens of columns about christian persecution and the situation in sudan at the time. and i think that there's a complacency, there was a complacency afterwards, after that success in sudan, after the north-south conflict of course in darfur, now the mountains is dreadful, and the repression of christians in the north sudan is horrible, but there was that success and then there was the international religious freedom act coalition that succeeded as well back in those days come in the late '90s. so i think those two things, people, the o