CAP Freedom of Conscience Contributes to the United Nations Report on International Solidarity and Faith Based and Humanist Organizations

On 1 November 2026, CAP Freedom of Conscience submitted its input to the report of the Independent Expert on human rights and international solidarity devoted to faith based and humanist organizations. The report will be presented at the 65th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in June 2027.

A report on the role of belief communities and humanist organizations

The forthcoming report examines how religious, belief and humanist communities and organizations promote mutual respect, peace, social cohesion and common understanding across diverse societies. It seeks to identify the risks these organizations face, as well as best practices, and it aims to provide recommendations to open spaces for further international solidarity actions. The Independent Expert called for concrete examples, and contributions may be published on the mandate page and referenced in the report.

Our understanding of international solidarity

In our submission, we explain what international solidarity means for an organization such as ours: a concrete commitment, across borders, that the freedom to have, keep, change or manifest a religion or conviction becomes effective for everyone, beginning with the most isolated and least popular communities.

This understanding guides our daily work: legal expert opinions used in asylum and international protection proceedings concerning members of persecuted minorities; advocacy before the Human Rights Council, including our recent written and oral statements on the situation of Shincheonji members in the Republic of Korea; hundreds of conferences organized over more than thirty years; and joint action within coalitions such as the European Federation for Freedom of Belief and the European Network on Religion and Belief, which gather organizations of all convictions and none.

Documenting the restrictions placed on solidarity work

Our contribution also answers the questions of the Independent Expert on the restrictions that organizations like ours may face. We documented, with court decisions, the obstacles we have encountered in France as a watchdog organization monitoring public policies on religious minorities: refusals to communicate administrative documents on the use of public subsidies, annulled by the administrative court of Paris on 16 May 2025 and 28 May 2025; and the refusal of an almost entirely publicly funded association to publish our right of reply, ordered by the judicial court of Marseille on 2 December 2024 and confirmed by the court of appeal of Aix en Provence on 9 January 2025. On 12 March 2026, the same court recalled that the right of reply is a general and absolute right.

Three recommendations

On the basis of this experience, our submission suggests three directions for the report. First, mechanisms set up by states to monitor religious or belief groups should be bound by clear obligations of neutrality, methodology and transparency, as courts have begun to recall. Second, access to administrative documents concerning the use of public funds in this field should be effectively guaranteed, since watchdog organizations depend on it. Third, the right of reply, a simple and effective remedy against stigmatization, should be protected as the general and absolute right that courts have recognized.

We will follow the preparation of the report and remain at the disposal of the Independent Expert for any further information or documentation.

The call for input of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights: https://www.ohchr.org/en/calls-for-input/2026/call-input-report-international-solidarity-and-faith-based-and-humanist