Persecuted Christians abroad will have their protection bolstered by the British government, following a landmark pledge to adopt a new definition of anti-Christian discrimination and persecution.

Last year the former foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, commissioned Philip Mounstephen, the bishop of Truro, to spend six months examining the extent and nature of Christian persecution as well as assessing the UK government’s response.

Among the recommendations proposed by the Bishop included: establishing a UN security council resolution urging Middle East and northern African countries to do more to protect Christians, send UN observers to monitor the effectiveness of security measures, impose sanctions on regimes found to have committed “serious human rights abuses” against religious minorities, and create a Magna Carta Fund dedicated to their protection.

Other recommendations included rolling out mandatory training to help staff at home and abroad better identify persecution in all its forms as well as adopting a definition of anti-Christian discrimination and persecution, similar to those applied to Islamophobia and antisemitism.

Now it has emerged that the government plans to implement all the recommendations “in full”.