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Brian Pellot
As Cape Town's water crisis nears 'Day Zero,' faith groups spring into action
In drought-stricken Cape Town, residents are hoarding bottled water and showering over buckets in anticipation of "Day Zero," the unprecedented moment when engineers close most of the city's faucets.
As Trump cites ‘honor killings’ in new travel ban, UK debates banning the phrase
As civil liberties advocates in the U.S. criticize President Trump’s reference to “honor killings” in a new travel ban, saying it smears and targets Muslims, one Muslim member of the U.K.’s Parliament is acting on separate concerns that the phrase legitimizes rape and murder.
In January, Conservative Member of Parliament Nusrat Ghani proposed a bill in the House of Commons that would prohibit use of the term “honour killing” in official publications.
State Department report: Religious persecution makes migrants out of millions
And then there were nine. Secretary of State John Kerry announced Monday that Turkmenistan has joined the State Department's list of worst religious freedom offenders.
The State Department's "Countries of Particular Concern" list had remained static since 2006, when eight countries -- Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Uzbekistan -- were designated as CPCs.
Rabbi David Saperstein tapped as first non-Christian to serve as U.S. ambassador for religious freedom
President Barack Obama on Monday said he plans to tap Rabbi David Saperstein as the next ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, the first non-Christian to hold the job, which was created in 1998.
As ambassador, the man named as the most influential rabbi in America by Newsweek magazine in 2009 will head the State Department's Office of International Religious Freedom and will be tasked with monitoring religious freedom abuses around the world.