The US' deep concern about the sectarian violence in Egypt
Laura Rosen on Froeign Ploicy
When Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gives a speech on Internet freedom at the Newseum Thursday, among those listening to her closely will be Egyptian blogger, Bassem Samir.
Samir, of the Egyptian Democracy Academy, was one of a group of Egyptian bloggers and activists arrested last Friday after organizing a demonstration protesting sectarian violence in the southern Egyptian city of Nagg Hamadi that killed six Coptic Christians on church steps on their Christmas Eve earlier this month.
“We are very concerned and we’ve expressed concern publicly about the tragic events there last week,” Posner said. “These were people that were murdered on church steps on Christmas Eve. It’s part of what we see as an atmosphere of intolerance …. There need to be a sense conveyed at the highest levels of this government, and repeatedly, that these types of crimes will not be tolerated, and there will be consequences. People will prosecuted and put to jail if they commit these sorts of crimes.”
The bloggers and rights activists were arrested the morning after Posner's speech when they arrived in Nagg Hammadi to demonstrate for Muslim-Christian solidarity and against sectarian violence. Among those arrested was one blogger, Wael Abbas, who had met with Posner, who was on his first trip to the region as assistant secretary to meet with officials in Egypt, Jordan and Israel about human rights issues. The bloggers and activists were charged, but released some 24 hours later. (Egypt has been under a state of emergency since 1981.)
Samir, who arrived in Washington today to take part in a delegation of Arab and American civil society leaders, is scheduled to meet this week with the NSC's Samantha Power, Gayle Smith, State's Posner, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Arab reform issues Tamara Wittes and Clinton. On Wednesday, the group's due to take part in a Hill event organized by the Project on Middle East Democracy, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and Georgetown University, keynoted by Sen. Robert Casey (D-PA), the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations sub committee on the Near East and South Asia. (Casey’s legislative advisor Damian Murphy is a former longtime staffer with Freedom House, which recently declared Egypt “unfree” in its annual freedom index.)
Though the Obama administration has taken a generally less preachy approach to promoting democracy in the Middle East than its predecessor, it pays close attention to the religious violence issue, says Stephen P. Cohen, author of Beyond America’s Grasp: a Century of Failed Diplomacy in the Middle East.
"The U.S. pays a lot of attention to what happens with the Copts,” Cohen says. “It’s a Christian issue it can’t avoid. Egypt gets very annoyed when the U.S. goes too far into the Coptic issue, because it’s one of the most sensitive to the whole of Egyptian society.”
Wittes is expected to go to Cairo and Tunisia later this week.
The Posner and Wittes Cairo trips come as the State Department is due to release its annual report on the state of human rights around the world next month.
Though the Obama administration has in recent months got senior officials in place working the human rights and Arab reform issue, it has like administrations before it more pressing agenda items with Middle East autocracies than promoting democracy. In particular, the Obama administration is working closely with the Egyptian leadership to try to revive Israel Palestinian peace talks. The Egyptian Foreign Minister and intelligence chief met with Clinton earlier this month on the peace process.
"Egypt is working very hard to get an agreement between Hamas and Fatah, and Egypt has been keeping up its relationship with Israel," Cohen said. "Egypt is the only active player in the game at this time -- not Israel, not the Palestinians, and not the U.S. So that is why they were here."
And it is also one reason why the Egyptian democracy and human rights issue is likely to remain mostly a second tier agenda item for the administration looking for reliable partners to help advance its Middle East peace vision and maintain an international alliance to pressure Iran in the face of numerous obstacles.
“The U.S. has to be able to do multiple things at the same time, whether in Egypt or China or anywhere," Posner told POLITICO Monday. "The truth is, we have to be able to treat Egypt as a friend on the peace process and security matters and a place where we also have an interest in promoting human rights and opening up society to critics and creating a more democratic process."