Ambassador Anton Pinter (left), Head of the Permanent Mission of Slovakia to the OSCE, meeting with Nicolae Gheorghe, Head of the ODIHR's Contact Point for Roma and Sinti Issues, at the Human Dimension Implementation Meeting in Warsaw in October. In co-operation with the OSCE Chairmanship, the ODIHR or- Freedom of religion or belief ganized a Supplementary Human Dimension Meeting on Beginning with the 1975 Helsinki Final Act, freedom of Freedom of Religion or Belief in July. The meeting examined, thought, conscience, religion, or belief has been one of the and sought to develop, best practices among participating core commitments that each OSCE participating State has States in accommodating freedom of religion or belief and agreed to respect. its manifestations and resulted in recommendations on what OSCE states and international organizations can do to more Too many people in the OSCE region, especially members of effectively protect their citizens' right to freedom of religion. minority groups, continue to face restrictions on their right to manifest their religion or belief. Such restrictions may be the In addition to working on legislative issues and conflict pre- result of state legislation and policies, or they can arise from vention, the ODIHR Advisory Panel of Experts on Freedom of intolerance based on other, often majority, religions or beliefs. Religion or Belief is involved in the development of programmes that promote tolerance; it has provided substan- The ODIHR aims to stem such intolerance and promote free- tive input into the development of a Website Guide for Tol- dom of religion or belief for every individual in the context of erance Education, which is being created at the Jagellonian its work in promoting tolerance and combating discrimina- University in Krakow (http://tolerance.research.uj.edu.pl). tion on all grounds. Targeting teachers and students, the website provides information on some 50 organizations in three languages: Eng- Promoting freedom of religion or belief cannot confine itself to scrutinizing laws and regulations only but also entails the promotion of tolerance, mutual understanding, and inter-religious dialogue. In addition to its legislative work, the ODIHR supports workshops that bring together religious groups and communities, state officials, academics, and diplomats. At a conference co-organized by the ODIHR and held in Osh, Kyrgyzstan, on 3 and 4 December, participants reaffirmed that repression of religious groups is not an acceptable response to religious fundamentalism and extremist political movements and came to the conclusion that, too often, repression served only to drive peaceful believers towards violent extremism. It was also stressed that freedom of religion is not contrary to national security. lish, Polish, and Russian. Death penalty While the vast majority of OSCE participating States have abolished the death penalty, it is actively retained in four: Belarus, Tajikistan, the United States, and Uzbekistan. In addition, three participating States - Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and the Russian Federation - retain the death penalty but have introduced a moratorium on executions. In its work on monitoring the use of the death penalty, the ODIHR aims to increase transparency as well as compliance 54