A/75/211 or ethnic minorities and not religious minorities. Such a restrictive approach is not supported by the wording of United Nations instruments or their interpretation, as set out in jurisprudence and the present report. While not being exhaustive, the contextualization of the provisions of United Nations instruments dealing with the rights of minorities and their interpretation in the past few decades suggest the following with respect to the intent and wording of the provisions, confirming the significance and scope of the category of religious or belief minorities: (a) The category of “religious minority” includes non-religious or non-theistic and other beliefs. This category should be understood broadly to include unrecognized and non-traditional religions or beliefs, including animists, atheists, agnostics, humanists, “new religions”, etc.; (b) As in the case of the category of linguistic minorities, a religion can be a minority religion even if it is official or recognized; (c) Refusal by authorities to acknowledge the existence of a particular religion or belief, or an official categorization of a religion or belief as a sect, a prohibited cult, an aberration or even a threat, and therefore not a “real religion or belief”, is not determinative. Whether a religious or belief minority exists is a factual, objective matter of whether there are in a State a minority of individuals who freely ascribe to a particular religion or belief; (d) Religious or belief minorities, such as atheists, Scientologists, B aha’is, Ahmadis, Mormons, agnostics and others, however they are described or recognized in a State, are entitled to the full protection of their human rights in international law, including as persons who belong to a religious or belief minority and again st acts of violence or persecution; (e) Large religious groupings can be made up of different sets of beliefs or traditions. Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism include a number of religious or belief divisions and therefore potentially minorities. Catholics are a religious or belief minority in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as are Shi ’a in Yemen. Shaktism in India and Haredi Judaism are also minority religions or beliefs; (f) Followers of non-hierarchical or non-formalized religions or beliefs, including shamanism and new religions, can also constitute a religious or belief minority. The presence of a religious or belief minority, such as the Falun Gong in China, of brujería followers in the United States of America and Latin American countries, or Rastafarians in Ethiopia, or of böö mörgöl shamanism in Mongolia, all objectively constitute religious or beliefs minorities, regardless of their traditional link or degree of presence in a State. 4. National or ethnic minorities 60. The final two categories of minorities in United Nations instruments are described together because they tend to be viewed as similar, if not necessarily identical. 61. Some submissions affirmed that the categories of national or ethnic minorities were now largely synonymous, and a prominent voice at the time of the formulation of the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities appeared to share that position, stating that “[t]here is hardly any national minority, however defined, that is not also an ethnic or linguistic minority ”.23 62. In a number of the submissions, however, a slightly different understanding was presented, in the sense that national minorities seemed to refer exclusively to __________________ 23 16/20 See E/CN.4/Sub.2/AC.5/2001/2, para. 6. 20-09835