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As part of the strategic planning process underway at the IARF Secretariat in Oxford, we have taken the time to review web sites that focus primarily on religious freedom issues. Dozens of web sites dealing with this subject now exist. While IARF does not necessarily endorse any of the following sites, nor take positions on their diverse content, we did find some especially useful sites that we thought were worth referring to our membership.

Please note that the list below does NOT include sites dealing with human rights in general, or with most interfaith initiatives. We have also excluded several U.S.-based sites dealing with religious liberty concerns.

• The U.N. web site for freedom of religion can be found via the office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights at: http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/hrissues.htm from this page go to "Religious Intolerance."

• The Oslo Coalition on Freedom of Religion or Belief monitors these issues on a world-wide basis. Their very thorough web site at http://www.hri.ca/partners/forob includes reports from the U.N. and relevant documents. Clicking on "Country Analysis" will take you to maps of the world from where you can find the text of different countries’ Constitutions on this topic.
• One of the most popular sites on this topic is at http://www.religioustolerance.org/, a site maintained by the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance. It has good background information on different religions, as well as links to very extensive papers, essays, and bibliographies on the subject of religious tolerance.
• A Brussels-based site called Human Rights without Frontiers has produced country by country reports since 1997 on freedom of conscience and religion. This can be accessed via http://www.hrwf.net
• Amnesty International has only recently launched an Interfaith Network for Human Rights. The developing site is at http://www.anmestyusa.org/interfaith/index.html

• The Interfaith Newswire has access to press releases and links to religious web sites across the globe. It is at: http://www.humanitarian.net/interfaith/
• Religion News Service at http://www.religionnews.com/ contains news about religion, ethics, spirituality and moral issues.
• A subscription based service, http://www.newsroom-online.com, or Worldwide Newsroom, purports to widen the scope of news coverage to include questions of ethics and religion.
• Worldwide Faith News has a database of news releases and policy statements from world faith groups. They are at: http://www.wfn.org/index.html
• The International Coalition for Religious Freedom (http://www.religiousfreedom.com) -- affiliated with the Unification Churcch -- has a helpful link ("News") to the top international stories on religious freedom.

• The U.S. State Department offers some of the most thorough reports on country violations of religious freedom at http://www.state.gov/www/global/human_rights/
• The U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom at http://www.uscirf.gov is an independent monitoring body whose website has extensive congressional testimony.
• The Centre for Religious Freedom at Freedom House has a national campaign to defend persecuted Christians. They also publish a report titled "Religious Freedom in the World." They are at: http://www.freedomhouse.org/religion

• A website titled "Christians in Crisis" chronicles persecutions against Christians and can be found at: http://www.members.aol.com/biblprof/crisis.htm
• A site at http://www.hrchina.org/topics/religion.html has links to articles and papers specifically related to religious persecution in China.
• The Keston Institute at http://www.keston.org monitors freedom of religion and researches religious affairs in communist and post communist countries.

• Global ethics was a particular area of interest for our organisation in the 1990’s. A site based in Germany, at http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/stiftung-weltethos/, focuses on inter-religious research, education, and encounter.
• IARF shares office space, and co-operates closely with, two other organisations in Oxford -- the International Interfaith Centre and the World Congress of Faiths. These are at: http://www.interfaith-center.org and www.worldfaiths.org
• Just for inspiration, a site called http://www.worldprayers.org/ has prayers from various faith traditions, including a prayer archive.

Copyright 1999 © International Association for Religious Freedom
2 Market Street, Oxford OX1 3EF, United Kingdom
Tel. 44 (0)1865 202 744, Fax 44 (0)1865 202-746
iarf@interfaith-center.org http://iarf-religiousfreedom.net