This report outlines an October 2010 meeting of scholars and policymakers at Georgetown University which explored the relationships between religious freedom and national security. Two panels of scholars and policy experts engaged the question of whether there is a link between America’s national security and levels of religious freedom abroad, especially in Muslim-majority nations. Rashad Hussain, U.S. special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference, delivered the keynote address. Some panelists argued that there was an important relationship between religious freedom and national security. Some reasoned that a more effective U.S. policy of advancing religious liberty in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq would help counter religious terrorism in those countries, and increase the security of the United States. One panelist strongly disagreed with these assessments, insisting that the absence of religious freedom is not a cause, but an effect of extremism, and that U.S. international religious freedom policy cannot successfully be used to undermine it. This report features a series of excerpts from this vigorous discussion.
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