Bishop Pasanti: Muslims and Copts are one in Egypt
Egypt, Politics, 9/16/1999

Bishop Pasanti catagoricaly denied in a television interview broadcast by Egyptian Television with a group of thinkers, writers and men of religion regarding allegations by a small group of emigrant Copts that there is persecution of Copts in Egypt.

He said, "We can not generalize saying, that the emigrant Copts are those stirring these allegations, but there are a very few of the emigrant Copts who are pushed by foreign elements from the USA or Israel to make these allegations, and I would like to say that we are a minority yet a numerical and not an ethic minority. And here I would like to use Lord Kromer's phrase in which he said, 'I came to Egypt to differentiate between its Copts and Muslims yet I could not for that I found them as one texture.'"

In his interview, he negated any charge of persecution of the Copts, and said that incidents took place in which lots of Muslims were killed, more so than Copts, as results of terrorism or crimes that are take place and do not differentiate between Muslims and Copts." He added that the government does not discriminate.

Bishop Pasanti stated that the USA is motivated by purely economic and strategic motives, as he pointed to what happened in the Gulf War and the rapidness of America's immediate intervention, adhering to petroleum interests only, while it has not interfered in Burundi or Rwanda.

Rgab El-Banna, editor-in-chief of October magazine, said, "There is nothing called persecution of Coptics, and there is no difference between Muslims and Copts in rights and duties, as they are one texture and what happened was managed by Jewish groups and the USA itself."

Previous Stories:
  Four Egyptian Islamic extremists killed   (9/8/1999)
  Ganzouri: Mubarak's US visit rebutted religious persecution charges   (8/5/1999)
  Pope Shenuda: No persecution of Copts, and we do not accept foreign intervention   (6/24/1999)

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