Conference: “Religious Freedom Development in the Sphere of Law” – Yerevan, Armenia

With thanks to Ryan Andersen

From May 13-15, 2015 scholars and attorneys from the United States, Europe, and Central Asia met in Yerevan, Armenia to participate in the conference “Challenges and Opportunities: Religious Freedom Development in the Sphere of Law”.  The International Center for Law and Religious Studies and the Coordinating Counsel for CIS and Baltic Countries on Theoretical and Practical Aspects of Religious Studies (Kyiv, Ukraine—Moscow, Russia) co-hosted the event, which focused on the development of law and religion in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

See conference reports and photographs from the website Religions in Armenia.  More Conference photos are here.

Topics ranged from religion and the environment, the religious aspect of the conflict in Eastern Ukraine and its effects on religious life in Ukraine, religious divides between eastern and western Europe, and the role of new religious movements in society. The conference also provided a forum for the participants to interact and build working relationships. The program included the Vice Minister of Justice of Armenia Arman Tatoyan, Vladimir Ryakhovsky of the President’s Human Rights Council of the Russian Federation, and Professor Cole Durham, Director of the International Center for Law and Religious Studies at Brigham Young University. With attendees from countries such as Poland, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Estonia, the United States, and Germany, presentations were given in English, Russian, and Armenian.