CAMPAIGNERS have voiced concern that no religious-freedom envoy has been announced in time to represent the UK at an international conference of government ministers, religious leaders, and civil-society figures on 10 October.

Furthermore, the Bishop of Winchester, the Rt Revd Philip Mounstephen, said that the continued lack of a Prime Minister’s Special Envoy for Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) risked squandering Britain’s reputation as a leader in the field.

Sources expressed concern that the lack of appointment of a special envoy was the result of Downing Street politics or inertia at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO).

The International Ministerial Conference on Freedom of Religion or Belief is due to take place on Thursday, hosted by the German Government’s Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, and its Commissioner for Freedom of Religion or Belief, Frank Schwabe, as well as the 38-member International Religious Freedom or Belief Alliance (IRFBA). It will look at challenges posed by artificial intelligence, such as increasing surveillance and transnational repression.

Until July, the IRFBA was chaired by Rishi Sunak’s Special Envoy for FoRB, the former Conservative MP Fiona Bruce.

Sources told the Church Times that, in the absence of a special envoy, they understood that the UK Government might send Foreign Office officials who were not senior specialists in FoRB issues. The FCDO and Cabinet Office were contacted for comment.

Ben Rogers, a co-founder and trustee of Hong Kong Watch and the deputy chair of the Conservative Party Human Rights Commission, said that he was “disappointed and concerned” by the lack of an appointment. “The British Government was one of the leading governments in the world to prioritise freedom of religion or belief,” he said. Several prisoners of conscience had been released after Fiona Bruce and the IRFBA spoke up regularly about their plight, he said. “International attention . . . certainly can help.”

Bishop Mounstephen said that it was “a very great shame” that a special envoy had not been appointed in time for the conference. “There is a danger of the UK losing hard-earned traction in this critical area [and] of the developing expertise in this area in the Foreign Office being lost and dissipated,” he said. The appointment “will certainly be noticed by concerned partners, including the US, and will be warmly welcomed internationally”.

Mervyn Thomas, the founder-president of Christian Solidarity Worldwide, who chairs the UK FoRB Forum, and is a member of the IRFBA’s council of experts, said that the lack of an appointment was “very disappointing”.

In an interview published before the election, Sir Keir Starmer told Premier Christianity magazine that, if elected, “Labour will be a champion of religious freedom”, but did not reply directly when asked about keeping the position of special envoy (News, 2 August).

The crossbench peer Lord Alton said: “An appointment is long overdue. The Ministerial in Berlin will be impoverished by the absence of a UK special envoy on FoRB. This is an issue around which the UK has built up global respect. It would be a tragedy for that to be squandered – not least for the millions of people who suffer for their religion or belief . . . this is no fringe issue, but central to how we conduct our international policies.”

Mr Thomas praised Ms Bruce for increasing the size of the IRFBA from 30 members to 38, and recalled that one of the recommendations of the 2019 review by Bishop Mounstephen, requested by the then Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, was that Britain should “articulate an aspiration to be the global leader in championing FoRB”. “How can we, if we’re not at the Ministerial at a senior level?” Mr Thomas asked.

The review, in which Bishop Mounstephen assessed the Foreign Office’s record on religious freedom, makes, in Mr Thomas’s view, “a great blueprint for how we go about tackling the abuse of freedom of religion or belief around the world”. Its recommendations were accepted by the governments of Theresa May, Boris Johnson, and Mr Sunak.