President of the U.S. Copts Association Michael Meunier about the Religious Oppression of Copts in Egypt

The following are excerpts from an interview with Michael Meunier, president of the U.S. Copts Association, which aired on ON TV on January 15, 2010.

Interviewer: You say that "growing up Christian in an Islamic state" made you "yearn for a better life..."

Michael Meunier: Everybody does.

Interviewer: "...free from religious oppression." That's a serious accusation.

Michael Meunier: Why? Everybody yearns for a better life.

Interviewer: You are accusing Egypt of organized religious oppression.

Michael Meunier: Are you saying that there is no oppression in Egypt?

Interviewer: This is not about me. You are the one who should answer. You say that there is organized religious oppression in Egypt.

Michael Meunier: Read the sentence in English.

Interviewer: "Mike yearned for a better life, free of religious oppression."

Michael Meunier: The word "organized" is not there. I said "religious oppression."

Interviewer: "So he immigrated to the Unites States of America in 1990."

Michael Meunier: Religious what? "Oppression."

Interviewer: Right.

Michael Meunier: What happens in Egypt, according to the UN and its definitions... To put it simply, oppression, according to the UN definition, takes place when the government sees a man oppressing his neighbor for any reason – not necessarily religious – and refrains from doing something about it. The government is entrusted with the protection of the citizens. This constitutes oppression. The definition is very simple. In Egypt, people think that only when people are slaughtered in the streets does it constitute oppression. No. The international definition of "oppression" is not like that at all. The word I used...

Interviewer: No, that's what the word means.

Michael Meunier: I used the word "oppression" – not "discrimination" or "persecution."

Interviewer: There is a great difference between using the word "oppression," and saying that there are sometimes clashes, conflicts, or misunderstandings.

Michael Meunier: What I gave you was the UN definition. Take a look at what goes on in Egypt, and you tell me. When people destroy a church, [the government] makes a reconciliation between the parties. What's this?

[...]

Interviewer: Patriarch Shinoda has recently talked about the rule in Egypt, and about what is going on in Egypt, and he was not as upset as you are.

Michael Meunier: Upset about what?

Interviewer: He said himself that the ruler must come from the ranks of the majority, and that a Copt cannot rule Egypt.

Michael Meunier: I do not dispute that the ruler should come from the majority, but I disagree with one thing that the patriarch said – that a Copt is not capable of becoming the Egyptian president. We know that the reality is that no Copt can become the president of Egypt. No one from among the majority...

Interviewer: This is in keeping with the principles of democracy.

Michael Meunier: The principles of democracy made Obama, who is from the minority, the US president. I am talking about popular beliefs and about the religious surge, which lead the parliament to decide that the pigs should be slaughtered, even though pigs have nothing to do with swine flu.

Interviewer: That was a purely medical scientific issue.

Michael Meunier: It was neither medical nor scientific, as is well known. We are not the only country to kill the pigs because of the Muslim Brotherhood MPs...

Interviewer: Neither you nor I can pass judgment on this.