Religious Prisoners of Conscience
Through the Religious Prisoners of Conscience (RPOC) Project, USCIRF Commissioners advocate for the release of individuals imprisoned for their religious belief/non-belief, religious activity, religious freedom advocacy, and other related issues. The project seeks to raise public awareness of these prisoners, reduce the overall number of prisoners in captivity, and highlight religious freedom conditions in their country of imprisonment. RPOCs represented in the project are only a snapshot of the thousands of religious prisoners of conscience around the globe as exhibited in USCIRF’s Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) Victims List.
Prisoners included in the RPOC Project are part of USCIRF’s FoRB Victims List, a database that documents individuals who have been detained, imprisoned, disappeared, tortured, placed under house arrest, or subjected to forced renunciation of faith for their religion or belief in countries USCIRF recommends for designation by the U.S. Department of State as Countries of Particular Concern (CPCs) or for placement on its Special Watch List (SWL), as well as in countries USCIRF recommends nonstate actors for designation as Entities of Particular Concern (EPCs). Learn more about the FoRB Victims List here.
Read the RPOC Project section of USCIRF's 2022 Annual Report here
Current Religious Prisoners of Conscience
Mubarak Bala Nigeria
USCIRF Advocate: Frederick A. Davie
Mubarak Bala is a self-identified atheist from Kano State in northeast Nigeria. He became well known in 2014 when the media reported that he had been forcibly drugged and committed to a psychiatric unit by his family members after telling them he was atheist.
Read more >Gulmira Imin China
Gulmira Imin is a Uyghur Muslim and former web administrator for the Uighur-language website Salkin. Ms. Imin was also a government employee in Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region in northwest China.
Read more >Raymond Koh Malaysia
Pastor Raymond Koh (Pastor Koh), is a Christian pastor from Malaysia. Prior to his abduction, he ran an NGO focused on people living with HIV/AIDs, recovering addicts, and single mothers and children.
Read more >Jimmy Lai China
Jimmy Lai escaped communist China to Hong Kong at the age of 12. Despite his UK citizenship, he chose to remain in Hong Kong to advocate against the encroachment of the Chinese communist government on Hong Kong’s freedoms.
Read more >Gedhun Choekyi Nyima – The Panchen Lama China
Gedhun Choekyi Nyima was born on April 25, 1989, in Lhari County, Tibet. After the death of the 10th Panchen Lama, His Holiness the Dalai Lama chose Gedhun on May 14, 1995, to be the 11th Panchen Lama, which is the second highest position in Tibetan Buddhism.
Read more >Leah Sharibu Nigeria
On February 19, 2018, ISWAP attacked the Government Girls Science and Technical School in Dapchi, Yobe State, Nigeria. ISWAP abducted 110 girls, five of whom were reported killed in the abduction.
Read more >Yahaya Sharif-Aminu Nigeria
USCIRF Advocate: Frederick A. Davie
Yahaya Sharif-Aminu is a little-known Islamic gospel musician from Kano State, northern Nigeria. He belongs to the Tijaniyya order, a popular Sufi Islamic order across North and West Africa.
Read more >Deacon Zhang Wen Shi North Korea
Deacon Jang Moon Seok, also known by his Chinese name, Zhang Wen Shi, is an ethnically Korean Chinese citizen who lived in Changbai, China, a town on the border between China and North Korea.
Read more >Adil Tuniyaz China
USCIRF Advocate: Nury Turkel
Adil Tuniyaz is a well-known Uyghur poet, reporter at the state-run People's Radio, and author of the books Questions for an Apple and Manifesto for Universal Poetry. Tuniyaz and his wife, Nezire Muhammad Salih, were both arrested in December 2017.
Read more >Former Religious Prisoners of Conscience
Reda Abdel Rahman Egypt
USCIRF Advocate: Sharon Kleinbaum
Reda Abdel Rahman is a teacher at the al-Azhar Institute in the northern governorate of Sharqiya as well as a former blogger on topics related to Qur’anism. Over the years, Reda has been arrested several times, each time for his expressing his religious beliefs as a Qur’anist.
Read more >Patriarch Abune Antonios Eritrea
USCIRF Advocate: James W. Carr
Patriarch Abune Antonios was born on July 12, 1927, in Himberti, a town north of the Eritrean capital, Asmara. He was ordained as the third Patriarch of the Eritrean Orthodox Tawahedo Church in 2004.
Read more >Dilshat Perhat Ataman China
USCIRF Advocate: Tony Perkins
Dilshat Perhat Ataman is a Uighur Muslim from the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region of western China. During the late 2000s, he ran the popular Uighur-language website, Diyarim, which focused on social and cultural issues.
Read more >Raif Badawi Saudi Arabia
USCIRF Advocate: Nadine Maenza
Raif Badawi is a blogger and human rights activist who co-founded the website Free Saudi Liberals in 2008. Badawi and his colleagues intended the website to encourage debate on religious and political issues in Saudi Arabia despite the country's restricted civic space.
Read more >Pastor Andrew Brunson Turkey
USCIRF Advocate: Kristina Arriaga
Andrew Brunson, 50, is an American citizen who has lived in Turkey for 23 years. He is a pastor for the Izmir Diriliş (Resurrection) Church, a small evangelical Presbyterian congregation in the city of Izmir.
Read more >Dennis Christensen Russia
Dennis Ole Christensen is a Danish citizen, carpenter-by-trade, and entrepreneur imprisoned for his religious activity as a Jehovah’s Witness.
Read more >Pastor A Dao Vietnam
USCIRF Advocate: James W. Carr
A Dao, resident of Gia Xieng Village, Ro Koi Commune, Sa Thay District, Kontum Province, is a Protestant pastor of the Montagnard Evangelical Church of Christ (MECC).
Read more >Patriarch Thich Quang Do Vietnam
USCIRF Advocate: Kristina Arriaga
Most Venerable Thich Quang Do was born on November 27, 1928 in Thai Binh Province. Patriarch of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV) since 2008, Thich Quang Do has been a lifelong advocate for democracy, religious freedom, and human rights.
Read more >Hamid Kamal Mohammad bin Haydara Others
USCIRF Advocate: Johnnie Moore
The armed religious-political movement known as the Houthi sparked a civil war in Yemen when they turned against the government in 2015. They have promoted sectarian divisions and have cracked down on the tiny Yemeni Baha’i community.
Read more >Pastor Nguyen Cong Chinh and Tran Thi Hong Vietnam
USCIRF Advocate: Jackie Wolcott
Nguyen Cong Chinh is an evangelical pastor originally from the Quang Nam province, and has lived in the Central Highland provinces of Kon Tum and Gia Lai since 1985. He is a long-time pro-democracy activist and critic of the Vietnamese government’s ban on preaching in the Central Highlands.
Read more >Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee Iran
USCIRF Advocate: Anurima Bhargava
Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee is an author and a life-long campaigner for human rights and women’s rights.
Read more >Fariba Kamalabadi - The Baha'i Seven Iran
USCIRF Advocate: Kristina Arriaga
Fariba Kamalabadi was born on September 12, 1962, in Tehran, Iran. Ms. Kamalabadi graduated from high school with honors but was barred from attending university due to her Baha’i faith.
Read more >Bagir Kazikhanov Russia
USCIRF Advocate: John Ruskay
Bagir Kazikhanov was born on September 9, 1983 in the Republic of Dagestan, an administrative entity of the Russian Federation.
Read more >Shamil Khakimov Tajikistan
USCIRF Advocate: Nury Turkel
Seventy year-old Shamil Khakimov is one of 24 Jehovah’s Witnesses in Khujand and nearby towns in northern Tajikistan interrogated by the Department of Organized Crime Control in late January and early February.
Read more >Pwint Phyu Latt and Zaw Zaw Latt Burma
USCIRF Advocate: Daniel Mark
Zaw Zaw Latt and Pwint Phyu Latt are two Muslim interfaith peace advocates who have been imprisoned since 2015.
Read more >Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani Iran
Youcef Nadarkhani was born on April 11, 1977 to Muslim parents in Rasht, Iran. Though not religious as a child, he converted to Christianity at age 19, becoming a member of the Only Jesus Church.
Read more >Mahvash Sabet - The Baha'i Seven Iran
USCIRF Advocate: Kristina Arriaga
Mahvash Sabet was born on February 4, 1953 in Ardestan, Iran. Ms. Sabet moved to Tehran when she was in the fifth grade and eventually received a bachelor’s degree in psychology. Ms. Sabet married Siyvash Sabet on May 21, 1973 and has a son and daughter.
Read more >Abdul Shakoor Pakistan
USCIRF Advocate: Johnnie Moore
Abdul Shakoor was born February 2, 1937 in Qadian, India. He is married and the father of five daughters and two sons.
Read more >Hu Shigen China
Hu Shigen was born on November 14, 1955, in Jiangxi Province. He received his university education in Beijing and later taught at the Beijing Language Institute. The 1989 Democracy Movement, and the subsequent Tiananmen Square protests, jumpstarted Hu Shigen’s political activism.
Read more >Mohammad Ali Taheri Iran
USCIRF Advocate: Gayle Manchin
On May 4, 2011, Taheri was again arrested and tried under charges of “touching the wrists of female patients,” “blasphemy,” “producing and distributing audio-visual material,” “interfering in medical science,” “earning illegitimate funds,” and “distribution of audio-visual products and use of ac
Read more >Nguyen Bac Truyen Vietnam
Nguyen Bac Truyen is a legal expert who leads the Vietnamese Political & Religious Prisoners Friendship Association, which assists prisoners of conscience and their families.
Read more >Maryam Naghash Zargaran Iran
USCIRF Advocate: Clifford D. May
Maryam Naghash Zargaran, a Christian convert from Islam and former children's music teacher, was arrested on January 6, 2013.
Read more >