Washington: Presumptive Republican Party presidential nominee John McCain vowed in a speech today to make freedom of religion a key foreign policy issue if he is elected to the White House in November.

"There is no right more fundamental to a free society than the free practice of religion," said McCain, speaking at Oakland University in the state of Michigan.

"Behind walls of prisons and persecuted before our very eyes in places like China, Iran, Burma, Sudan, North Korea and Saudi Arabia are tens of thousands of people whose only crime is to worship God in their own way.

"As president, I intend to make religious freedom a subject of great importance for the United States in our relations with other nations. I will work in close concert with democratic allies to raise the prominence of religious freedom in every available forum," McCain said.

He added: "Whether in bilateral negotiations, or in various multinational organisations to which America belongs, I will make respect for the basic principle of religious freedom a priority in international relations."

According to McCain, no society "that denies religious freedom can ever rightly claim to be good in some other way. And no person can ever be true to any faith that believes in the dignity of all human life if they do not act out of concern for those whose dignity is assailed because of their faith."

Source : PTI