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13 July 2005, 14:28A representatives of the Russian Federation Government rejects the criticism against the Law on the Freedom of Conscience
Moscow, July 13, Interfax - The Russian Government representative to the State Duma, Andrey Loginov, does not agree with those who believes the Russian Law on the Freedom of Conscience discriminates religious minorities.
The critics of the law are discontent, in particular, with the reference made in its preamble to the special role that the four religions, Orthodoxy, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism, have played in the history of Russia.
‘If we take the European law, we will see that a reference to traditional religions in the law is rather an exception than the rule’, A.Loginov said in an interview published on Wednesday in the NG-Religia supplement to Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily.
According to A.Loginov, it is fully consonant with ‘the spirit of our history and the civilizational specificity of relations between the state and religious organizations’.
‘The format of the Law on the Freedom of Conscience is so wide that there are opportunities for development within the norms sealed in it for both the Russian Orthodox Church and a tiny religious community. But no one of us will ever equate them’, A.Loginov remarked.
He says that ‘the state, just as society, is aware that there are various religious organizations. And it gives preference only to some of them, recognizing their historical services and importance for Russia’. |
