As the second largest church movement in the world, the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) represents the interests of over 600 million evangelical Christians in 143 national alliances at the United Nations in Geneva, Bonn and New York.

The United Nations Human Rights Council is based at the UN in Geneva. As part of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), all 193 UN member states are evaluated every four and a half years regarding their respect for human rights. Our efforts are particularly focused on advocating for those countries where the human rights and religious freedom of our fellow believers and other minorities are violated. We contribute to the Human Rights Council through reports and oral statements to highlight the precarious situation of oppressed and persecuted Christians and other religious minorities worldwide and to propose solutions for improving their situation.

At the same time, our Permanent Representatives engage in discreet, dialogue-oriented diplomacy (soft diplomacy) and relationship building with ambassadors, heads of state, ministers, and other high-ranking political representatives. In this way, away from the media, we maintain open channels of communication with challenging states and interact with local governments and religious leaders as part of peacebuilding and conflict resolution interventions to advocate for our churches and other faith communities—and sometimes even to save lives.

This two-pronged approach has proven extremely effective in successfully serving our fellow believers around the world.

Further information can be found on our English website: https://un.worldea.org/geneva-office/