Representative to the US Stanley Kao (高碩泰) and Ambassador-at-large for Religious Freedom Pusing Tali have been invited to take part in a US-organized international religious freedom forum next week in Washington.
The second Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom forum will be held in Washington from tomorrow to Thursday, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章) said yesterday.
This is the second year that Taiwan is to send a government representative to take part in the annual event. Kao attended the first forum in July last year.
“By attending the meeting, Taiwan hopes to share its experience in upholding freedom, democracy and human rights with like-minded countries to jointly promote religious freedom worldwide,” Lee said.
At last year’s meeting, the US urged like-minded partners to launch the Potomac Plan of Action that called on participating states to create an ambassador-at-large for religious freedom.
The US also formed the International Religious Freedom Fund (I-ReFF) to help persecuted religious minorities around the world.
In response to the US’ call, Taiwan in March named Pusing Tali as the country’s first ambassador-at-large for religious freedom, while hosting a two-day Indo-Pacific forum on religious freedom.
Pusing Tali, the president of Yushan Theological College and Seminary and an Atayal, was chosen due to his decades of teaching theology to Taiwan’s Aborigines.
Also in March, Taiwan donated US$1 million to I-ReFF to be used to promote religious freedom worldwide.
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