A report by the Czech academic center Sinopsis highlights “major donations” by United Front’s “heavyweights” to finance French “influence diplomacy.”
Massimo Introvigne
Alibaba Software Selectively Monitors Trips To and From Xinjiang
Foreign journalists who go to the Uyghur homeland are spied. So are Uyghurs who visit Shanghai.
France: Female Basketball Player Banned for Playing with Headscarf
Salimata Sylla denounces a discrimination, noting that the International Basketball Federation allows female players to play with headscarves.
Tai Ji Men in Leuven: Dizi Sing, Speak, and Present Their Case in a Leading Academic Conference
Belgium’s academic capital hosts an important yearly conference on freedom of religion and belief. Tai Ji Men dizi were there.
New False Blasphemy Charges in Pakistan
A Christian woman and a Muslim man have been falsely accused of burning Quran pages. They now risk the death penalty.
Anthroposophy: French State Television Censored for Its Anti-Cult Bias
The French Council of Journalistic Ethic and Mediation found that France 2 relied excessively on apostate ex-members, and presented a distorted view of Steiner schools.
China Kidnaps Southern Mongolian Dissident in Mongolia
Chinese police took writer Lhamjab Borjigin from his residence in Ulaanbaatar and deported him back to China.
Brazil: Uber Driver Accused of Anti-Candomblé Religious Intolerance
He refused to take to a terreiro a family dressed according to their religion, and is now under police investigation.
L’anti-sectarisme à la mode de Caen : Pour éviter un procès, la MIVILUDES s’exécute face à la Scientology
Confrontée à un procès, la mission gouvernementale française de lutte contre les sectes republie son rapport annuel en y incluant une réponse de l’Église de Scientology.
Father Kolbe, Press Freedom, and the Tai Ji Men Case
Kolbe is remembered for his heroic death in the Nazi camp of Auschwitz. He was there for his defense of freedom of the press and truth, a lesson also relevant for the Tai Ji Men case,
Massimo Introvigne
Massimo Introvigne (born June 14, 1955 in Rome) is an Italian sociologist of religions. He is the founder and managing director of the Center for Studies on New Religions (CESNUR), an international network of scholars who study new religious movements. Introvigne is the author of some 70 books and more than 100 articles in the field of sociology of religion. He was the main author of the Enciclopedia delle religioni in Italia (Encyclopedia of Religions in Italy). He is a member of the editorial board for the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion and of the executive board of University of California Press' Nova Religio. From January 5 to December 31, 2011, he has served as the "Representative on combating racism, xenophobia and discrimination, with a special focus on discrimination against Christians and members of other religions" of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). From 2012 to 2015 he served as chairperson of the Observatory of Religious Liberty, instituted by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in order to monitor problems of religious liberty on a worldwide scale.