A new report from the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) warns that governments across the world are using torture to suppress religious belief, directly violating international law.
In its 2025 annual report released Oct. 20, the federal commission detailed evidence of regimes in countries, including Afghanistan, China, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Turkmenistan, systematically targeting religious groups through torture, public humiliation, and other cruel punishment.
“Governments around the world continue to breach international law by engaging in torture and ill treatment of individuals despite the international prohibition on torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment,” the commission said in a fact sheet summarizing the report. “In certain circumstances, violations of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) can reach the threshold of torture or ill treatment.”
USCIRF cited multiple case studies highlighting how individuals have endured extreme abuse for their religious beliefs.
In Afghanistan this year, Taliban authorities reportedly carried out four public executions in one day for alleged violations of religious edicts, while also using flogging, beatings, and lashings against prisoners, sometimes forcing them to renounce their faith, the USCIRF said. The United Nations recorded at least 213 such punishments in the first half of 2025.
In China, more than one million individuals, primarily Uyghur Muslims and other ethnic minorities, remain imprisoned in internment camps across Xinjiang. The USCIRF fact sheet said Beijing’s campaign seeks to “erase ethnic and religious identities” through forced indoctrination and bans on religious practice.
Russia was also cited for “widespread and systematic torture” of both Muslims and Christians. The report described beatings, forced beard shavings, prayer bans, and the confiscation of religious items. Russian forces allegedly abducted and tortured to death Father Stepan Podolchak, a priest of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, the USCIRF reported.
Meanwhile, in Turkmenistan, prisoners jailed for holding unregistered religious meetings have been brutally beaten. The fact sheet noted that similar patterns were reported throughout Central Asia.
In its fact sheet, the commission urged the U.S. government to “strengthen its advocacy” for victims of religious persecution abroad, including those who have suffered torture or other inhumane treatment.
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