Violence to Christian women

Pioneering Report on Disappearance, Forced Conversions and Forced Marriages of Egyptian  …

WASHINGTON, Nov. 10 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The Disappearance, Forced Conversions and Forced Marriages of Coptic Christian Women in Egypt a pioneering report on human trafficking-was released today by Christian Solidarity International (CSI) and the Coptic Foundation for Human Rights.

Researched in Egypt by American anti-trafficking specialist Michele Clark and Egyptian women’s rights activist Nadia Ghaly, the report documents a criminal pattern involving deception, sexual violence, captivity, compulsion to convert to Islam and forced marriage. This disturbing phenomenon corresponds to internationally recognized definitions of human trafficking. . . .

Egypt’s prestigious Al-Ahram Weekly recently broke a longstanding taboo by acknowledging that allegations of widespread conversion and forced marriage of Coptic girls to Muslim men have brought relations between the country’s Christian community and the Islamic authorities to a boiling point. (Al-Ahram Weekly On-line, 3-9 September 2009, no. 963)

Writing today to President Barack Obama, Dr. John Eibner of CSI urged the U.S. government “to encourage Egyptian President Mubarak to take credible measures to combat the trafficking of Christian women and girls.” Eibner furthermore stated “the unhindered and unpunished trafficking of Christian women and girls in Egypt is a litmus test for the true state of relations between Muslims and non-Muslim minorities.”

Last June in Cairo, President Obama addressed the Muslim world, calling for a new beginning in relations with the United States, and the need to uphold the rights of religious minorities and the rights of women.

The Clark-Ghaly report concludes by urging human rights institutions to undertake further research on this largely unexplored facet of human trafficking in Egypt.

Contact Elliott Daniels, (202) 544 7778 or (919) 440 9729, elliott.daniels@csi-usa.org.

To view or download the full report visit www.csi-int.org.

SOURCE Christian Solidarity International (CSI)

Copyright 2009 PR Newswire. All rights reserved and the full PR Newswire article here.


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