The US State Department has stated that “there are ongoing reports of societal abuses or discrimination based on religious affiliation” in Bulgaria in their 2009 Religious Freedom report.
The 2009 Report on International Religious Freedom section on Bulgaria stated; “The Constitution provides for freedom of religion and prohibits religious discrimination but designates Eastern Orthodox Christianity as the "traditional" religion. Laws executing these provisions are ambiguous, giving scope to arbitrary decisions with respect to public practice of religion by unregistered groups.”
The report added; “The Government generally respected the religious freedom of registered religious groups. There were some concerns regarding government registration of religious groups and interference with religious disputes. There were also continuing reports of intolerance from local authorities during the reporting period.”
The main criticism in the introduction of the report read; “There were ongoing reports of societal abuses or discrimination based on religious affiliation, belief, or practice. Discrimination, harassment, and general public intolerance, particularly in the media, of some religious groups remained an intermittent problem.”
The report also gave many examples of discrimination in Bulgaria including; “On March 3, 2009, three Molotov cocktails were thrown at the mosque in Varna that had been vandalized with graffiti in May 2008,” and “On February 26, 2009, the Orthodox bishop of Veliko Tarnovo led a protest march and presented a petition to the mayor of Gabrovo signed by 5 000 city residents opposing the construction of a Jehovah's Witnesses prayer house in Gabrovo.”
Elsewhere in the report, North Korea and Iran were said to be the world's worst offenders in abusing religious freedom, the US State Department confirmed.
"It is our hope that the ...report will encourage existing religious freedom movements around the world and promote dialogue among governments and within societies on how best to accommodate religious communities and protect each individual's right to believe or not believe as that individual sees fit," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton concluded, while introducing the report to the press.
Author: DannyHaszard, 27 Oct 2009 09:50:37
US State Department Slams Bulgaria Religious Intolerance
Jehovah's Witnesses and their *lack of* religious tolerance freedom of speech.
They will extol and preach *God's Kingdom* and this sounds attractive,what they hide from you is their Watchtower society version that Jesus has already had his second coming in 1914 and is working *invisibly* through them.
They have won 37 of their 46 US Supreme court cases assuring us all of freedom of speech and assembly and equal protection under the law.
The sad irony is that the Watchtower Society *daily* abuses the human rights of thousands of its members. It denies current members the right of free speech by forbidding them to speak to former members, even close family members.
And it denies former members their right of freedom of worship by refusing to allow them to leave the religion with dignity, should they come to disagree with Watchtower's practices or doctrines.
The religion of Jehovah's Witnesses is an oppressive cult that controls every aspect of its members' lives.
Jehovah's Witnesses have lots of crime and hurting they just have a cult enforced code of silence and cover it all up.
Much child abuse.
Research and read Jehovah's Witnesses murders and torture murders
http://www.watchtowernews.org/familymurders.htm
http://dannyhaszard.xanga.com/ A cult obsessed with death
Author: Candace54, 27 Oct 2009 11:43:42
US State Department Slams Bulgaria Religious Intolerance
Jehovah's Witnesses are considered a dangerous cult in many European countries and definitely under investigation because governments are concerned by the mind manipulation, child molestation cover-ups, breaking up of families due to shunning, as well as other atrocities taking place within the religion.
Victims of Watchtower hard-line organizational policies are speaking up to government officials about their experiences and they are responding with assistance.
Author: SaveOurS, 28 Oct 2009 09:12:38
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bulgaria's leaders need to decide NOW whether the country's sovereignty means anything to them.
EU membership is one thing, sovereignty is a different issue.
The second thing Bulgaira's so called leaders need to pay attention to is where the message comes from.
Here, the message comes from the US Dept. of State headed by Hillary Clinton.
Why on earth you would take seriously the words coming from the mouth of a devout socialist and in this case from a Department of State of a country which is currently fighting for its own identity. In other words, if the opinion comes from the mouth of a liberal/socialist/federally preconditioned system, why would you consider it at all.
Bulgaria and its domestic policy follows a different dynamic, which has to be determined by the conditions and the people in the counrtry itself. Nothing else matters.
Author: Bill, 28 Oct 2009 10:37:40
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
SavOurS:
"Here, the message comes from the US Dept. of State headed by Hillary Clinton."
Mrs. Clinton is merely a political appointee suddenly thrust into the State Department. Do you really think she had anything to do with this report? She hasn't been in office that long, and for most of the time since her appointment she's been travelling.
I didn't look at the date on that report, if there was one, but it may well ahve antedated Mrs. Clinton's appointment.
You may well disagree with the report, but don#t blame it on her just to make your point. Take the report or leave it, but don't read things into it which aren't there.
Author: Bill, 28 Oct 2009 10:43:14
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
SaveOurs:
P.S.
I don't like Hillary Clinton, either. She's a political opportunist interested mostly in retaining power. She got to be a Sanator from New York without ever having lived in the state, under circumstances which remain questionable to this day. She dropped her husband when he got into trouble, and has been trying to hang onto power ever since.
What I'm suggesting is that you're laying the blame for the contents of the report on her. She may well have announced the report, but that's no indication that she either wrote it or influenced it.
Author: viking, 28 Oct 2009 15:12:39
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bill,
"She's a political opportunist interested mostly in retaining power."
Please name for me any politician, in any country, who this does NOT describe.
Author: Bill, 28 Oct 2009 15:30:29
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Viking:
Good point, Don, but somehow I see her as more aggressive, even vicious, about it.
I think "honest politician" is an oxymoron anyway.
At least, in the US, I don't think you have to deal so much with something we see all the time here. The politicians come up with an idea they know the public won't like, and the first thing you hear is, "Well, we'll discuss that after the elections".
I think things are going to be rough here for a while. The opinion polls I've seen show that the public is skeptical about the newly-installed government, if not outright opposed. And, of course, the ousted socialists are going to be crowing about how ineffective the new government is at correcting what THEIR government instituted. The "Great Coalition" was about as useful as Johnson's "Great Society", and for the same reasons.
Check this out from the LA Times this morning:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-big-banks28-2009oct28,0,6717971.story
This looks like a big contradiction to me. If the government is going to make the big banks and their shareholders take the bite for bank failures, I can't see them following the government's other program of making credit easier to get for otherwise ineleigible borrowers.
Check it out, and let me know if you see it any differently.
Author: viking, 28 Oct 2009 16:08:33
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bill,
Where did you get the facts for your statement "government's other program of making credit easier to get for otherwise ineligible borrowers." This is a half-truth started by people like your friend Smellie and her ilk to divert the blame for the financial crisis.
The true blame is on the banks and mortgage companies who used this excuse to buy and resell mortgages and making a profit every time the "churned" each one.
I am surprised you cannot see this and follow the line espoused by the Smellie.
I like the whole idea in the LA times article and can see nothing wrong with this problem solving. The only thing I worry about is what might happen to those who practice fiscal responsibility. My small bank in Minnesota has never foreclosed on a home, from 1908 until today, and I would hate to see them suffer because of another banks stupid decisions!
When someone enters the equity market, they take a gamble and if they expect high returns they should also accept a loss if the guess wrong.
Author: viking, 28 Oct 2009 16:15:41
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bill,
You do know that FIGMENT is Smellie, right?
Author: Bill, 28 Oct 2009 16:20:21
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Viking:
I agree with you, but I'm "reasonably sure" that I've read that part of Obama's stated program was to ease credit restrictions so as to improve home ownership for low-income people. As I understand the whole mess, and I'm pretty far removed from it personally, it really started with the banks having borrowers default on their loans, which really shouldn't have been granted to begin with.
Author: FIGMENT, 28 Oct 2009 16:21:52
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
viking
I am a FIGMENT of your imagination.
How is the ugly fat old communist slut? She didn't bounce you yet? Don't worry, she will.
Author: Bill, 28 Oct 2009 16:26:07
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Viking:
Right now, everyone and his brother is attacking my religion, and I really don't care who's behind what nick. For reasons of their own, they direct their venom at me personally, although I hold no position in the Church whatever. They're simply barking up the wrong tree, yet they keep on and on.
But just for FIGMENT's information, right after I saw his post, I contacted the Church's missionary headquarters, and asked about this "free English lessons" bit. The answer I got was that they didn't know of any such program in our organizaton, but you never know what the missionaries themselves may come up with.
However, this type of operation is completely foreign to our kind of work, so if anyone actually is using this kind of "bait", it's not our people, and the proselyters of no other church would use the BoM as a textbook so I have to view that bit of "news" as another FIGMENT of the imagination.
Author: FIGMENT, 28 Oct 2009 16:28:39
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bill
" As I understand the whole mess, and I'm pretty far removed from it personally, it really started with the banks having borrowers default on their loans, which really shouldn't have been granted to begin with."
And to take it one step further--why did the banks lend to worthless borrowers? Because the mortgage brokers were getting fat commissions for every loan they made, good or bad. And because the lending banks did not keep these mortgages, they sliced them and diced them and sold them as financial instruments to investors, many of them pension funds, sovereign funds, and China. China bought a lot of bad US debt. Had the banks been made to hold on to their bad debt instead of selling it off, they would have been more responsible about their lending practices. And that's precisely what the Fed is trying to do now--come up with regulations so that the lenders can't slough off their responsibility for bad loans by selling mortgages and bad loans to investors.
Author: FIGMENT, 28 Oct 2009 16:32:10
US Department of State 2009 Religious Freedom Report Re: BG
Bill
" For reasons of their own, they direct their venom at me personally, although I hold no position in the Church whatever."
What!?! After all this time, effort, and money invested you are not even an elder yet? Bill!!!!!! Are you even worthy any more? When was the last time you saw a temple recommend?
