Christians arrested in Egypt for their faith are running out of time

August 22nd was the International Day in Commemoration of Victims of Violence Based on Religion or Belief. This day was established five years ago by the United Nations to draw attention to the plight of minorities around the world who are persecuted because of their religion or belief.

Religious persecution is increasing around the world and takes many forms. One form that is becoming increasingly popular is prolonged pretrial detention. Members of religious minorities are detained after the authorities learn of their beliefs, but no official charges are brought. There is no trial. The trial itself is the punishment.

This is currently happening in Egypt.

A 55-year-old father of five has been in an Egyptian prison for two and a half years for no other reason than his status as a member of a religious minority.

Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo, a Yemeni national, grew up in a Muslim family and practiced Islam his entire adult life in Yemen until he and his wife converted to Christianity. Because of her conversion, Abdo's wife was murdered by her extended family – they secretly switched their cooking oil for gasoline, which caused an explosion in 2014 as she was preparing breakfast one morning.

Since the lives of Abdo and his children were also at stake because of their Christian affiliation, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees granted Abdo and his children refugee status and they fled to Egypt to seek asylum.

His family was just settling into their new country when Abdo was arrested in December 2021. To date, he has not been formally charged with a crime, nor has there been an official trial. The government has granted Abdo's lawyers very limited access to him, reportedly because it labeled him a “security risk.”

His arrest came after he and another man, Nour Girgis, who was born into an Egyptian Christian family, joined a Facebook group with other converts. The group offered Christian converts to Christianity a seemingly safe and peaceful place to discuss theological issues.

However, shortly after joining the group, both Abdo and Girgis were arrested. Like Abdo, Girgis remains in prison to this day, with no official charges brought against him and no end to his imprisonment in sight.

Egypt has one of the largest Christian minorities in the Middle East. It is estimated that there are about 16 million Christians living in the country. The majority of Christians in Egypt are Coptic Christians, who are viewed differently by the authorities than converts from Islam to Christianity.

According to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, the persecution of Christians in Egypt has continued unabated in recent years, with the government selectively protecting religious minorities.

Under Egyptian law, religious minorities, including those who leave Islam, have the same rights as Muslims. Article 64 of the Egyptian constitution states that freedom of religion is absolute. However, only members of the “revealed” religions (Muslims, Christians and Jews) are allowed to practice their faith publicly and build places of worship.

There is no law preventing Egyptian Muslims from converting to Christianity. In practice, however, the authorities view conversions from Islam to Christianity as an attack on the authority of the state and a trigger for sectarian violence.

The principles of Sharia regulate the personal status and religious affairs of Muslims in Egypt. According to certain interpretations of Sharia, conversion from Islam to Christianity is punishable by death. The family members of Christian converts are also discriminated against and are the target of violence, threats and social exclusion.

As a result, many Egyptian converts are forced to lead a double life: they profess their Christian faith in private, but act as Muslims in public.

Those who decide against a life in hiding risk not only social discrimination and harassment, but also state punishment. Numerous laws in Egypt are regularly used to circumvent the state's official protection of minorities and to punish converts.

For example, Article 98(f) of the Egyptian Penal Code criminalizes acts or expressions of “unorthodox religious views, including denigrating or contemptuous of a religion revealed by God or its adherents, or undermining national unity or social harmony.” Such vaguely worded laws give the authorities leeway to prosecute religious minorities at their own discretion.

In most cases, Christian converts are arrested on false charges of “terrorism,” but are never formally charged or brought to trial because there is no evidence to support these allegations.

Terrorism is defined broadly in Article 86 of the Egyptian Penal Code to include “any use of force, violence, threat or intimidation” with the aim of “disturbing public order or endangering the security of society”. The term also prohibits “preventing or obstructing the work of public authorities, places of worship or educational institutions or disrupting the application of the constitution, laws or statutes”.

Terrorism laws have been used as a weapon against minority groups, including Jews, whom the Supreme Administrative Court banned from participating in their annual Abu Hasira celebration in 2020.

Earlier this month, Abdo announced in a heartbreaking letter to his wife and children that he would go on hunger strike in protest against his unjust and illegal detention. The lack of due process has brought him to the brink of collapse. With neither charges nor hearings giving him any hope of release, he is protesting the injustice against him with the only tool he has left: his life. With his health rapidly deteriorating, it is feared that his days are very limited.

Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), who also chairs the State Department's Committee on Global Human Rights and co-chairs the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, said Abdo's release is now “more urgent than ever.” Smith called on the Egyptian government to “release Abdo to a safe situation” and appealed to the UNHCR to “protect and prioritize vulnerable or at-risk applicants, including Christian converts from Islam and those accused of blasphemy.”

Smith knows it is not uncommon for prisoners of conscience to die in custody. Since 2022, Dzhemil Gafarov in Russia, Asghar Kalar in Pakistan, Abune Antonios in Eritrea, Mahsa Amini in Iran and Phan Van Thu in Vietnam, among others, have been wrongfully imprisoned for their religious beliefs and have breathed their last in custody.

International pressure has not worked in Abdo's case, as the conflict in the Middle East leaves little room for people in the region who suffer grotesque human rights violations that have nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. US diplomatic pressure, historically strong in cases like Abdo's, has waned as diplomatic relational capital is reserved for a solution to the Gaza conflict.

Given the difficult relationship dynamics the U.S. government finds itself in, members of Congress like Smith have the opportunity and the duty to fill the vacuum and put pressure on Egypt to release Abdo and Girgis, and to threaten punitive measures under the International Religious Freedom Act if these cases are not addressed quickly.

Kelsey Zorzi is the Director of Global Religious Freedom Advocacy at ADF International. She leads efforts to address and combat the persecution of Christians and other religious minorities around the world.