Local leaders in Qena Governorate in Upper Egypt have resolved a conflict over a Christian woman who allegedly converted to Islam, sources in Qena say.
Scores of Muslim Brotherhood members and fundamentalist Salafi Muslims surrounded the police station of Koos, in Qena, on Thursday, calling for the release of Christine Waheeb Bolos, a 17-year-old student who allegedly converted to Islam from Christianity.
As yet, there has been no official confirmation or evidence of the girl's alleged conversion, although rumours of her conversion have spread rapidly since she was apprehended by police after running away from home.
Security sources say that the girl disappeared from her home in Edfu, Aswan on Monday and that her father then filed a complaint to the police. She was stopped at a police checkpoint in Koos while on her way to Cairo, according to Hesham al-Qady, a former Muslim Brotherhood parliamentary representative from the area.
The news of the girl's detention by police was spread by the men travelling in the car with her when she was stopped. People then gathered around the police station to demand that the girl be given police protection, fearing that she would be returned to her family.
“The prosecutor’s office in Koos interrogated the girl and issued its order to the police to provide her with protection,” Qady said.
Local leaders eventually convinced the protesters to end their protest after the security director for Qena came to Koos and took the girl into his custody, according to Qady.
“Qena’s security director took the girl with him and he told the people that he would apply the law. Nothing will be done except according to the law,” said a local security source, who asked not to be identified because he is not authorized to speak publicly.
As of Thursday evening, the girl was still in official custody. However, because she is a minor, she will most likely be returned to her family.
“We’ve tried hard to calm down the situation in order not to let things develop in the way that they did in Imbaba,” the security source told Al-Masry Al-Youm.
The incident comes just days after clashes between Coptic Christians and Muslims in the Cairo neighborhood of Imbaba left 12 people dead, more than 200 injured, and a church gutted by fire.
The Imbaba clashes erupted after scores of Muslims tried to storm St. Mina’s Church in Imbaba to free a Coptic woman who was alleged to have converted to Islam and was reportedly held in the church against her will.
Qena is home to one of the largest Coptic communities in Egypt and has witnessed much sectarian strife. Last year, a drive-by shooting on Christmas eve in the Qena city of Naga Hammadi left six Copts dead.
More recently, thousands of protesters staged an 11-day sit-in against the appointment of a new governor Emad Mikhail, a Coptic Christian with ties to the regime of ousted President Hosni Mubarak.
