Freedom of religion or belief in the armed forces focus of event co-organized by ODIHR and EUROMIL in Warsaw

Sharing experiences from the OSCE region on the best ways to accommodate the religious and spiritual practices and needs of armed forces’ personnel was the aim of an event co-organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and the European Organisation of Military Associations (EUROMIL) on 14 September 2017 in Warsaw. The event took place in the framework of the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting, Europe’s largest annual human rights and democracy conference.

Experts, representatives of armed forces and defense ministries, chaplains, religious advisers and humanist counsellors from Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom discussed international standards and practices related to freedom of religion or belief in the armed forces, exploring how states regulate this right in the military context.

“OSCE participating States have committed themselves to ensuring freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief for all and to prohibiting discrimination on any grounds, including religion or belief. These principles are enshrined in major international human rights instruments,” said Ewa Sapiezynska, Human Rights Officer at ODIHR.

“Armed forces should, whenever possible, accommodate religious practices by members, including worship, prayer, access to representatives of their religion or denomination, observance of holy days and fasting, and observance of dress and dietary requirements,” said Sgt. Ahmed Dhalai, Assistant to the Islamic Religious Advisor at the British Ministry of Defense.

“The right to freedom of religion or belief of servicemen and servicewomen remains under significant pressure, hence the importance of this event,” said Caroline Henrion, Policy Manager at EUROMIL. “Military service should be open to everybody, regardless of religion. Meanwhile, we are happy to observe that more participating States now have military chaplains representing different religions, as well as positions of humanist counsellors.”

The event is part of ODIHR’s assistance to OSCE participating States in making their security sectors more human rights-compliant and gender-sensitive.