Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Robert Seiple
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000251B
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00:06 Welcome back to the Liberty Insider.
00:07 Before the break with guest Ambassador Seiple 00:10 we were talking about what was tied up and being 00:14 the first ever US ambassador for Religious Freedom 00:17 and how you interact it with another entity 00:21 that many people might not even know 00:22 existed the US Commission for Religious Freedom. 00:27 First all I need to say 00:29 its wonderful that in United States 00:31 for whatever complicated political machinations 00:34 ended up with such a broad structure 00:37 just concerning religious liberty 00:39 which or religious freedom 00:40 which shows that it is important. 00:42 We have always hoped 00:43 that there will be others that would follow. 00:46 We're hopeful that we could see it in the UK, 00:49 we could see it in Australia, we could see in Canada. 00:52 Well, Canada has essentially followed, yeah. 00:54 Yeah, has stunned this 00:56 and I have met with new ambassador there 00:59 and we have been on programs together. 01:01 And so it's nice to have someone else there. 01:04 But it was almost like you go ahead you do it 01:08 and we'll be the silent partner behind it. 01:10 We, we don't want to put our foot in that water 01:12 but we really are glad that you're taking the lead. 01:17 Yes, that's true but I wish we had more, more countries 01:21 that would have come along side of us 01:23 and we could have done so much together than individually. 01:26 Did you get much help from the European Union or any? 01:32 During my tenure none. 01:34 During my tenure none because this was all very new 01:37 coming into being I mean, European Union. 01:40 Even the European Union. Yeah. 01:41 There is sort of-- And they had other fish to fry. 01:44 Yeah. 01:45 And I guess we did too 01:47 and you have to go where you can get the biggest bang. 01:52 I didn't work at all with the UN. 01:55 Now the UN has programs 01:57 that are helpful under the UN disappeared today. 02:01 We would have to recreate effect similarly tomorrow. 02:04 But when push comes to show 02:05 then you have got a, a manmade disaster a war, a conflict. 02:11 UN has a terrible track record whether its Rwanda or Srebrenica 02:16 they were gonna a terrible track record. 02:18 So you have to pick your partners carefully. 02:20 Yeah. 02:21 And we'd normally would meet with these folks 02:23 and ambassadors in Sweden and Norway and Great Britain 02:30 because they were at least symbolical. 02:33 Yeah, in terms of what we were trying to do 02:35 and we do quietly behind the scenes 02:38 what they could do to help our job. 02:39 And what was some of the areas 02:41 that you got involved with during your tenure? 02:45 I could guess some of them the hotspots 02:46 where there is religious conflict? 02:48 Well, once a year you had to name 02:52 and shame and blame the worst offenders. 02:57 And this was about 5% of our entire year, 02:59 5% but if you are the media it was, it was the big story. 03:04 Who is on the list? Who do you have on the list? 03:06 And during the first year we had countries like China 03:10 but not countries like North Korea. 03:13 So how can you put China 03:14 when especially this came from China? 03:15 How could you put us on the list 03:17 and you don't even know what's going on North Korea. 03:19 That was the part of the problem 03:21 we didn't know as much about North Korea 03:23 as we knew about China. 03:25 North Korea has since made the list. 03:28 They've made the list. 03:29 The list of most egregious violators of religious freedom. 03:32 Did you ever get to North Korea? 03:34 No, no, no. 03:36 And during the course of my tenure 03:38 which was like 25 months I became 03:43 what's the word where they don't let you back in non 03:48 anyway I was, I was refused. 03:49 Persona non grata. 03:51 Persona non grata, thank you 03:52 see I mentally put that off 03:54 because I, I who wants to be persona non grata. 03:56 A strong term but I could see your fishing toward. 03:58 Yeah, yeah well, I was in China after they get me on the west 04:03 and in India. 04:05 India is a little bit interesting and different 04:08 but India sees itself as the biggest democracy of the world 04:13 and anybody that would say something 04:15 that would be negative about the democratic values 04:18 it's almost automatically a persona non grata. 04:20 Well, it's a reasonably functioning democracy. 04:24 I had may be 50% of the Indians liking 04:27 when I was doing 50% of the Indians 04:30 both abroad and in the United States 04:33 in terms of their communities in the US, 04:35 thinking that I was a worse thing 04:37 than it's ever happened to the country. 04:39 So outside of those two countries 04:42 the rest of the countries I had considerable freedom. 04:46 And I would say that the, 04:49 the folks who man the Middle East desk 04:52 who were most concerned about bringing in one more issue 04:56 like religion to the bilateral to our bilateral relationships. 05:01 They were the most opposed to what I was doing. 05:03 This complicated issue for us. 05:05 But they came around first of all we sent, 05:08 we put our best ambassadors in those hotspots 05:11 and so we could talk and we could have conversations 05:15 and they were once they saw 05:17 that I was in out to destroy their relationship 05:19 with the country through a punishment mechanism. 05:23 They came around and we did a lot of good. 05:25 And so where did you see the most positive 05:29 obviously positive one of feedback 05:31 but reaction or results? 05:34 Well, again we had a program on Laos 05:37 but Laos was one of the early ones. 05:40 I remember developing what became 05:42 a very, very strong friendship over many years 05:46 with ambassador Wang of Laos. 05:49 And he would come over to state department 05:52 and the state department wanted to put 05:55 somebody on egregious performing less 05:59 why not do Laos no one is going to. 06:01 It's like Burma, why not do Burma 06:03 no one is going to argue with that. 06:04 So we get that, that going that kind of mentality going. 06:08 And he would come over and say 06:09 but why do you want to do that you're such a strong country 06:11 we're such a weak country? 06:13 And I bought that, why would you want to do that? 06:16 Why don't want to try to fix this 06:18 as opposed to throwing the book at them 06:21 and taking in a country that's got 06:22 this high literacy rate, high poverty rate. 06:25 They need help, yeah. 06:26 And they need all the help in the world 06:28 and we are gonna step on them 06:30 through a religious freedom violations. 06:32 Let's solve that one so we can solve the other things 06:35 and when we began to do that 06:36 which is promotion rather than punishment 06:39 we got good results. 06:40 Now did you go to Burma, 06:41 you have mentioned Myanmar, Myanmar or Burma? 06:44 I have been to Burma with World Vision. 06:46 And I'm on a family foundation 06:49 that doesn't offer a lot of work in Burma 06:52 so there is a lot there that I'm closed to. 06:55 But if you look at what was going on in Burma 06:57 the first year they became one on the list. 07:00 And I have to say now they're 13-14 years later 07:04 I was ambivalent about that. 07:07 They had all kinds of coercive activities devoted to. 07:11 And they were equal opportunity oppressor. 07:13 Yes. 07:14 But when you looked at religion 07:17 it was always taking place 07:18 religious freedom violations on the border. 07:21 They are very, very conscience of their borders. 07:23 The Koreans and other groups like that. 07:24 Yeah, but you can have Christians in Mandalay. 07:29 You could have Christians in Yangon 07:31 and they keep changing the names back and forth. 07:33 But you could have 07:34 yeah Christians there who lived in relative peace. 07:37 No problems, or other religious, religions but at the border 07:42 and now cross the border they have a huge problem 07:45 with the, the Rohingya from Bangladesh. 07:50 We ran an article in Liberty recently on that. 07:52 Yeah. 07:54 You probably remember when Dr Graz and I went to Myanmar 07:59 we had they said the first ever meeting 08:01 of all the major religions got together there 08:03 and we had a discussion. 08:05 And they did give instances of persecution 08:07 but what I picked up was as much societal governmental 08:12 because its prejudices within their societies. 08:15 Sometimes even from the Buddhist it can be quite extreme. 08:18 Well, that's true but here I will make a strong statement 08:22 because we expend a lot of dollars private 08:25 and public dollars in Burma now to help things along 08:28 and to make things right. 08:29 And World Vision has been there for 20 some years 08:32 and have spent tens and millions of dollars 08:34 and have done a lot of good work. 08:36 But there has to continue to be fed 08:42 and we have to make sure that we pick the leaders 08:46 that were going to support very carefully 08:49 and we are going to have to let them know at point of gifting 08:54 the values that lie behind these gifts. 08:58 Because if you don't solve the religious freedom issue in Burma 09:03 you're not gonna solve any others lot of issues. 09:06 We all know working at religious liberty 09:08 its key to civil liberties generally. 09:09 That's right, that's right. 09:11 And you can't have one without the other. 09:12 And that's the factor that you first look at 09:14 when trying to see where a country is, 09:17 in terms of its development 09:18 under their treatment already with faiths. 09:20 And that will tell you and awful lot of about that country. 09:23 So until this is solved in Burma 09:27 none of the other large problems will get solved. 09:30 So looking back on it 09:33 and our time is sifting by quickly 09:36 obviously I'm sure it was a wonderful experience 09:39 but you left with optimism 09:40 they were I guess Laos senses that 09:44 but is there continuing need for US and US ambassador 09:48 may be it's a better way to put things so. 09:49 Yeah I think so. Yeah absolutely so. 09:52 I left it in the situation where we began to think 09:56 about what will do after the state department 09:59 after state department we started 10:00 the institute for global engagement 10:03 much more nimble faster didn't have to take things 10:08 through 50 different offices to get approval. 10:10 We did the kind of things that were necessary to do 10:14 in a private situation that we are used to do 10:17 in the public one. 10:20 To be an ambassador is an awesome responsibility. 10:24 Before there was even American Republic, 10:27 Benjamin Franklin was effectively acting that way 10:31 in Europe with the French 10:33 and Thomas Jefferson was one of our early ambassadors. 10:38 But what I remember personally is just before he died 10:42 my father has he faced his final surgery 10:45 and was being wheeled into that operation 10:47 that he didn't lived through. 10:50 He said to the young man 10:51 that was about to wheeling down to the operating studio. 10:56 He said, did you know he said I'm an ambassador 11:00 and the young man looked and startled 11:02 though he was so important personage 11:04 to be dealt carefully with him. 11:07 Dad said I'm ambassador for Christ. 11:10 At the end of the day each of us have that important role. 11:13 Ambassador Seiple had the privilege 11:15 to combine that with civil responsibility. 11:18 But each of us is called to be ambassador for Christ 11:21 and ambassador for religious freedom 11:25 and all the privileges that go with them. 11:29 For Liberty Insider this is Lincoln Steed. |
Revised 2014-12-17