Built to close a gap, not to make noise.

EqualFaith Europe started as one person’s legal research, done alongside a separate day job, because a pattern kept showing up: European law already protects people from religious discrimination — but the protections only work if someone actually files the complaint, drafts the memorandum, or pushes a regulator to act. Most people affected don’t have the time, the legal training, or the standing to do that. We do the parts that require it, so the law that already exists actually reaches the people it was written for.

What we are

EqualFaith Europe is in the process of establishing a Dutch not-for-profit foundation (stichting), with ANBI (public benefit organization) status as a subsequent step once that’s complete. It has no commercial activity. It runs on donations and EU grant funding, in line with standard practice for organizations of this kind.

How we work

The work is legal, not campaign-based. Formal memoranda, formal complaints, formal submissions — addressed to the European Commission, the European AI Office, national regulators, and courts, not open letters or petitions. The strategy is deliberately staged: legal filing, then regulatory escalation, then litigation if needed — each step built on the one before it.

Why access to rights, not identity politics

We talk about this as an access-to-rights problem, not an identity-politics one. The law is largely already there. The gap is enforcement — and that framing is deliberate: it’s what lets us work with secular institutions, EU regulators, and funders who care about rule-of-law and digital rights, not only faith-based partners.

The founder

Goran Kolouch holds an LL.B. in International Law and Human Rights from Hogeschool Leiden (Netherlands) and has produced EqualFaith Europe’s legal work independently over its first six months, self-funded alongside separate work.

Where we’re headed

A founding board is being assembled around the founder — chosen for independence, relevant expertise (legal, financial, communications), and fixed terms — so that governance sits with a board, not one person, as the organization grows.