Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently awarded seven individuals and a group of clergy the International Religious Freedom Award in recognition of their courage and commitment to promoting and defending religious freedom globally.
The first recipient, Farid Ahmed, has continued to spread a message of hope and forgiveness in New Zealand and across the globe after his wife was killed in the 2019 Christchurch Mosque attacks.
In Nigeria, Kola Alapinni is an international human rights lawyer who provides legal defense in multiple freedom of religion cases and challenges the constitutionality of Nigerian blasphemy laws.
Another award winner is Mirza Dinnayi, a courageous Yezidi human rights defender and religious freedom activist who has dedicated his life to saving victims of terrorism and discrimination, evacuating women and children from territories controlled by ISIS, and providing survivors with free rehabilitation and support.
Peter Jacob is a tireless advocate for religious freedom and human rights who has spent more than 35 years fighting for the rights of Pakistan’s marginalized religious minority communities.
Since 2019, Martha Patricia Molina Montenegro has documented the Nicaraguan government’s repression of the Catholic Church and religious communities. Fearing imprisonment after suffering months of police harassment, Molina fled Nicaragua in June 2021. Since 2022, Molina’s reporting has focused on documenting police harassment and government-led violations of freedom of religion, particularly against Catholic clergy in Nicaragua.
Born to a family of Holocaust survivors, Tali Nates of South Africa leverages her personal story as the founder and director of the Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Center to inoculate South Africans - especially youth - from growing rhetoric that dehumanizes vulnerable groups.
Lhadon Tethong is the co-founder and director of the Tibet Action Institute. She leads a team of human rights advocates in developing and advancing open-source communication technologies, nonviolent strategies, and innovative training programs for Tibetans and members of other groups facing repression by the People’s Republic of China.
Under pressure from Moscow, a group of five priests and two deacons from the Moscow-aligned Orthodox Church in Lithuania, condemned Russia’s war against Ukraine and were defrocked. Two priests from the Moscow-aligned Belarusian Orthodox Church, similarly condemned Russia’s war against Ukraine and fled to Lithuania. They built a new religious community in Lithuania that welcomes Orthodox believers seeking to worship free from Moscow’s influence.
The United States salutes these tireless advocates for religious liberty – a fundamental human right to which all people are entitled.
