Minister of Foreign Affairs John Baird says his department’s new Office of Religious …
OTTAWA – Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird says his department’s new Office of Religious Freedom won’t become a vehicle for playing domestic politics in Canada’s immigrant communities.
Baird dismissed criticism that the new office could lead to an uncomfortable mix of religion and politics.
“Freedom of religion is one of the first things in the Charter, it’s one of the first things in the Bill of Rights, it’s front and centre in the UN Declaration of Human Rights — it’s an essential human right; I don’t see any concern about that at all,” Baird told The Canadian Press in a year-end interview.
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A May briefing note to Baird, obtained under Access to Information, lays out three priority areas for the new office: protecting, and advocating on behalf of, religious minorities under threat; opposing religious hatred and intolerance; promoting the Canadian values of pluralism and tolerance abroad.
Baird has consulted internationally on the creation of the new office meeting with the Holy See in Rome, the Aga Khan, head of the Greek Orthodox Church in Turkey and the U.S. ambassador at large for international religious freedom.
“They accomplished a lot,” Baird said of his meeting last summer with Suzan Johnson Cook, the U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom.
But he added “ours will be a made-in-Canada approach.”
Read complete article at CA News Yahoo com
See also CBC New
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