Eurasia Panel public launch at the IRF Peace Builders Forum

The inaugural Eurasia Panel demonstrated the viability of a permanent, peer-led regional mechanism for advancing religious freedom, social cohesion, and prevention of radicalization across the post-Soviet space — addressing the lingering Soviet legacy of mistrust, excessive state control, weak civic initiative, and limited cooperation across religious communities through locally led collaboration rather than external pressure. Built on thirteen years of engagement, the Panel applies Covenantal Pluralism through Cross-Cultural Religious Literacy: practical training in evaluation, negotiation, and communication across sectors and religious difference. The 105-minute inaugural session brought panelists from Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia, and Uzbekistan across three sectors — civil society, religious leadership, and academia — framed by keynote supporters from partner democracies, with Moldova participating as a consultant member in the pre-event discussions, and confirmed that these countries have already developed transferable practices now being adopted across the regional network. Panelists named the Soviet legacy directly and answered each element of it with a practiced alternative from their own country’s record: Kazakhstan’s CCRL training for officials, prosecutors, and law enforcement, delivered in three cities since 2023, produced evaluation findings indicating a measurable shift in attitudes, with many participants ceasing to treat religious communities as objects of control and beginning to treat them as partners in stability — the Panel’s core outcome metric.