The Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief is an independent expert appointed by the UN Human Rights Council. Among his mandates from the Human Rights Council is “to promote the adoption of measures at the national, regional and international levels to ensure the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of religion or belief.” The focus of the Interim report, presented to the United Nations General Assembly on August on 4, 2016, “is on the broad range of violations of freedom of religion or belief and their manifold root causes, as well as additional variables, including from a gender perspective, which need to be taken into account for an appropriate analysis of the problems.”
The report defines the scope of the freedom of thought, conscience and belief and seeks to educate readers “to the broad range of violations, many of which do not attract adequate, if any, public attention.”
You can read the report here: http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Religion/A-71-269_en.pdf
