BELGIUM: Jehovah’s Witnesses’ prisoners cannot be visited any more by their chaplains, denounced at the OSCE
Warsaw Human Dimension Conference (OSCE/ ODIHR) – Plenary Session: Tolerance and Non-Discrimination
HRWF Oral Statement (13.10.2025) – Human Rights Without Frontiers is deeply concerned about the fact that chaplaincy activities of Jehovah’s Witnesses in a number of Belgian prisons are in practice not allowed any more.
Our NGO is also worried by the fact that Belgium has still not revised its system of State recognition of religious groups, despite an injunction of the European Court.
Since 2019, Jehovah’s Witnesses have written six times to the Belgian Minister of Justice and have initiated legal proceedings due to this discrimination experienced in four Belgian prisons: Nivelles, Leuze, Dinant, and Leuven Central.
In August 2023, the General Director of the penitentiary administration issued a circular letter to stop tolerating that religions not being recognized by the State provide spiritual assistance on request of their people in prison.
In April 2022, a ruling of the European Court in the case Jehovah’s Witnesses v. Belgium (*) considered that the system of state recognition of religions in Belgium was flawed and discriminatory, not compatible with the European Convention and should be revised.
Three years after that European Court ruling in April 2022, Belgium has still not revised its system of State recognition of religious groups. The chaplaincy issue raised before is one of the collateral damages of this failure.
In its ruling, the European Court declared
“Neither the criteria for recognition, nor the procedure by which a religion can be recognized by thefederal authorities, are set forth in statutes that meet the requirements of accessibility andpredictability inherent in the concept of the rule of law.”
“The examination of an application for recognition, the ECHR added, is not accompanied by any guarantee, either with respect to the adoption of the decision on such an application, or to the process leading up to a decision, or the appeal that may be made against it at a later stage.” The European judges also observed that there is no delay within which an application should be considered. A number of religious have been waiting for years to the recognized by the Belgian State.
The European Court suspects that the State non-recognition may be based on a value judgment about certain religions.
Until Belgium finally deigns to implement the injunction of the European Court, we recommend that the Belgian State be tolerant and allow Jehovah’s Witnesses in prison to be provided spiritual assistance every time they require it.”
(*) Anderlecht Christian Assembly of Jehovah’s Witnesses and Others v. Belgium – 20165/20
The chaplaincy issue was raised at the UN Human Rights Council 60th Session in Geneva by CAP/ Liberté de conscience and Human Rights Without Frontiers. VIDEO https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJGpayZhCEI
