Representatives of several Coptic movements protested Friday in front of the People’s Assembly, condemning recent violence between Muslims and Christians in the villages of Amiriya, outside Alexandria, and Meet Bashar, in the Sharqiya governate.
Participants included members of the groups “Copts unrestricted,” “Maspero Copts,” “The Coptic Coalition.” They called for the punishment of perpetrators of violence against Christians and restitution for damaged property.
Fady Youssef, coordinator of the coalition movement Copts, said that his organization will continue to march until “the law prevails, the Copts who have fled return to their families, and those who burn the property of Christians are punished.”
Thursday, six members of the Parliament’s Human Rights Committee met with the families affected by the violence.
Reports say the conflict started in Amiriya after the discovery of a love affair between a Coptic man and a married Muslim woman, evidence of which was photos of the woman on the man’s cell phone. Several families have been forced to flee the villages under pressure from religious authorities amid recent sectarian violence.
In Meet Bashar, sectarian tensions ignited over the rumored forced conversion of a young girl to Islam under pressure from her father.
Interreligious affairs and rumors of conversions are frequently cited as the reasons behind sectarian violence in the country.
Translated from Al-Masry Al-Youm
