c. 1998 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ Efforts to derail a proposed bill in Congress that would trigger automatic sanctions against nations found to persecute religious minorities accelerated this week on Capitol Hill and at the White House.

On Tuesday (April 28), the National Council of Churches _ which opposes the proposed Freedom from Religious Persecution Act _ brought a half-dozen foreign Christian and Muslim religious leaders to Capitol Hill to outline why they believe the bill would do more harm than good.”It is very important for us to distinguish between the morality of rhetoric and the morality of results,”said Amien Rais, who chairs a 28-million member Indonesian Muslim group called Muhamadiyah.

The bill, he said, could subject religious minorities to additional persecution because they would be blamed for whatever economic and social woes resulted from sanctions.

A day earlier, President Bill Clinton told members of the National Association of Evangelicals gathered at the White House that automatic sanctions could encourage presidents to overlook religious persecution violations to avoid triggering measures the executive branch considered diplomatically unwise.

The evangelical leaders were urged by the president to withdraw their previously announced support for the proposed bill, introduced in the House by Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., and in the Senate by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa.

In its first legislative test, the bill cleared the House International Relations Committee in mid-March. The full House could consider the measure as early as mid-May, said Anne Huiskes, a Wolf legislative aide. The Senate has yet to begin its consideration.

The bill has broad support among evangelicals and other religious conservatives, in addition to U.S. Catholic bishops and some Jewish groups. However, it has been opposed from its inception by the Clinton administration and the NCC as well as several of the mainline Protestant churches among the council’s 34 Protestant and Orthodox Christian member denominations.

The bill focuses on the most egregious acts of religious persecution _ such as violent attacks and enslavement _ that supporters say are common against religious minorities in some Muslim countries as well as former and present communist nations. Supporters say minority Christians are among those most often subjected to religious persecution.

Nations found in violation of the law would be subject to automatic sanctions, including a cut-off of all non-humanitarian American aid and American opposition to international loan requests made by the offending countries.

The Clinton administration has long argued such provisions might force the White House to deal harshly with some of this nation’s major allies and trade partners.

Congressional opponents of the Wolf-Specter bill have introduced a substitute measure giving the White House wider discretion in responding to a broader range of acts of religious persecution. Presidential options would range from a diplomatic protest through sanctions and a break in diplomatic relations.

The substitute measure has gained the backing of Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., the powerful head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Although opposed to Wolf-Specter, the NCC has taken no position on the substitute measure, the International Religious Freedom Act introduced by Senate Majority Leader Don Nickles, R-Okla.

However, the Rev. Albert Pennybacker, NCC associate general secretary, Tuesday characterized the Nickles bill as having”a number of elements … that are quite good.” Huiskes said any final bill emerging from the Congress is likely to combine features from both measures.

At the Capitol Hill news conference Tuesday, the foreign religious leaders brought here by the NCC said the Wolf-Specter bill was viewed overseas as a case of the United States unilaterally seeking to impose its political will.

The Rev. Riad Jarjour, the Beirut-based general secretary of the Middle East Council of Churches, said the bill evokes”memories of the Crusades”among Middle East Muslims.”They feel this bill is a new new Crusade in the sense that it’s a new invasion of American foreign policy and some evangelical groups who want to convert Muslims,”said Jarjour, a Presbyterian.”They see the bill as a way to create dissension between Christians and Muslims.”

DEA END RIFKIN