Over the past thirty years more than four hundred innocent Christians have been killed in cold blood with repeated government failures to prosecute the perpetrators and apply the rule of law.
January 2011 started with the bombing of a Coptic church in Alexandria, followed by the Egyptian revolution, we have witnessed various stages of development. One of the most concerning is the increasing incidents of attacks and violence against Christians and churches.
The most alarming of these instances took place on Sunday 9 October when a peaceful Christian demonstration against the burning of a church in Aswan was met with brutal force, leaving tens dead and hundreds injured after the use of live ammunition and the same aggressive tactics used by the previous regime.
What is of immediate concern is that while the situation has been unfolding this evening there has been broadcast by state media of unconfirmed allegations that Christian demonstrators killed soldiers. These allegations have been made without any investigations or recourse to witnesses or ballistic or forensic evidence. Such claims will increase justified attacks upon Christians.
We feel that the Egyptian Government or Military Council are no longer protecting Christians in Egypt, and we have in fact seen live coverage of Army trucks driving over and killing peaceful protestors.
We urge and call upon the international community to call for an immediate investigation into the occurrences of 9 October 2011, to take tangible steps towards giving Christians equal human rights in religious freedom, and comply with its’ obligations to observe the various human rights treaties to which it is party.
