The Christian right's sense of persecution begins in the child's complaint to the parent, "It's not fair".
Throughout the ages, individuals and organizations have revised historical realities and have also employed "religion" to justify the marginalization, harassment, denial of rights, persecution, and oppression of entire groups of people based on their social identities.
The violation of human rights, the persecution of MDC campaigners, the invasion of white-owned farms and disregard for the rule of law all supposed to have been dealt with under the pact have continued unabated.
Belief is one thing, but actively trying to harm and deprive other people of their rights is the definition of persecution".
Mr President, Oswaldo Payá, winner of the 2002 Sakharov Prize, stated in this very Chamber that thousands of his countrymen and women are fighting for their rights in the midst of persecution.
Mr Heseltine's real agenda lay deep in the detail of his Mail article where he made clear that the solution lies in persuading the rest of the European Union, and the United Nations if necessary, to tear up the 1951 Geneva Convention which guarantees the right of an individual fleeing persecution to seek asylum.
Ludmilka Alexeyeva, who leads the Moscow Helsinki Group rights movement, accused the state of "persecution of the museum".
The inhuman treatment that Meriam Ibrahim received deprived her of the most basic of human rights -- the right to live free from the fear of persecution.
Keith Best, of the Immigration Advisory Service, said that Saudi nationals who were in genuine fear of persecution had the right to claim asylum in the United Kingdom.
If anything, the bans and resulting court cases have given them a nimbus of persecution, that far-right populists love to exploit.
