A message of tolerance EURO-Mediterranean Foundation for the Dialogue between Cultures was officially launched yesterday, reports Magda El-Ghitany. Its headquarters to be hosted by Egypt's Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the foundation's goal is promoting tolerance and understanding between cultures of the European and the Southern Mediterranean regions. The foundation's inauguration was held under the auspices of Mrs Suzanne Mubarak. The atmosphere at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, alive with the harmonious dialogue of oriental musical instruments like the oud and qanoun and Western ones like the violin and cello, seemed symbolic of the task at hand. That message was also emphasised by many key Euro- Med officials who attended the event: Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni; secretary of state representing Luxemburg presidency Octavia Modert; European external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero Waldner; Swedish Foreign Affairs Minister Leila Freivalds; and Bibliotheca Alexandrina Director Ismail Serageddin. "Anna Lindh will help in bringing citizens of Europe and the Mediterranean closer, where [they can] know and understand each other, with full respect of each other's differences. [Ana Lindh] can thus be the light house for global and cultural understanding," Modert told the gathering. Lindh who was Sweden's minister of foreign affairs was slain by a lone assailant while shopping in a department store in 2003. The new foundation plans to organise several cultural events that will include participants from European and Mediterranean regions, enabling them to learn about, and deal with, each other's cultures, values and beliefs. The foundation also aims to fight all sorts of extremism, Islamophobia and discrimination; a goal that can only be reached "if we learn more from, and about each other," Freivalds said. Egypt's culture minister emphasised the significance of the foundation being hosted in Alexandria's multi- cultural atmosphere. Anna Lindh "can help to promote a common understanding for all humanitarian issues," he said. The event marks the first Euro-Mediterranean Foundation to be located in the Southern Mediterranean, with Egypt chosen as the host following heated competition with Italy, Cyprus and Malta. The Euro-Mediterranean partners are marking 2005 -- the tenth anniversary of the Barcelona declaration -- as the year of the Mediterranean. The Anna Lindh Foundation fits the 1995 declaration's pledge to promote "understanding and tolerance" between the Euro-Med partners through cultural dialogue. Security alert THE ISRAELI government advised its citizens on Sunday to stay away from Egypt's Sinai resorts during the upcoming Jewish Passover holidays. "We are recommending [that] Israelis not travel to Sinai over Passover because of the danger of terrorist attacks," Danny Arditi, the head of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's anti-terrorism office, told Israeli military radio. "The danger of attacks like the one we saw in October has not disappeared," Arditi said. Some 34 people, including 13 Israeli tourists, were killed last October in triple bomb attacks on the Taba Hilton Hotel and two other neighbouring resorts in Sinai. The Israeli government had warned people to stay away from Sinai before those attacks, but thousands of Israelis ignored the warnings. Although the number of Israeli tourists has slumped since the October bombings, up to 15,000 Israelis are still expected to stay in Red Sea resorts over the Passover holiday, which begins on Saturday. Conversion uproar AN ALLEGED forced conversion of two Egyptian Christians to Islam has triggered a demonstration involving tens of Copts in southern Cairo. The angry Christians demonstrated inside Barsoum Al-Erian Monastery on Friday, some on their fifth day of a hunger strike against the alleged kidnapping and forced Islamic conversion of two women. Wafaa Adli, 21, disappeared in November, and Nevine Albert, 19, disappeared last February. The demonstrators charged security authorities with collaborating to force the women to convert, and called on President Hosni Mubarak to intervene. Family members started a hunger strike in the monastery on 11 April, and some collapsed from hunger two days later and were taken to a nearby hospital, according to the archbishop of Barsoum Al-Erian Monastery. Security authorities denied any knowledge of the women or their conversion. Susan Albert said that state security officers contacted the family and the church a week after her sister disappeared, and said they had scheduled an "advisory session" because Nevine wanted to convert to Islam. The session was held in a police station, and the family was banned from seeing her, Nevine's sister said. Raafat Adli, the second woman's father, accused the police of holding his daughter against her will and forcing her to convert. The archbishop of the monastery said Wafaa Adli, mother of a two-year-old girl, fled her house with a Muslim neighbour because she wanted a divorce. This incident is the third of its kind to have taken place over the past six months. The first was in December, when the wife of a Coptic priest allegedly decided to convert to Islam, catalysing angry reactions in the Coptic community. After discussions with the authorities, she renounced her decision. The second case involved Fayoum medical students Marianne Makram Ayad and Teresa Ibrahim, whose church community also claimed they had been forced to convert to Islam. Again, hundreds of Christians gathered at a local church to protest. Coptic Christians make up some 10-15 per cent of Egypt's population. In cold blood A FARMER from the southern town of Dar Al-Salam was killed in a vendetta-style crime, after which three of the five suspected attackers were arrested. Investigations continue in the governorate of Sohag, as authorities search for the remaining two suspects in the killing of Hamed Ismail, 53. Ismail was gunned down while walking home late at night with his wife Saada Amin, 45, and Ismail's 15-year-old son Sayed. Ismail is a member of the Hababza clan, which is involved in a long-standing blood feud with the Barawra clan. The victim's wife identified five Barawra family members as the culprits. Despite campaigns to eradicate the phenomenon of vendetta crimes and blood feuds -- especially in Upper Egypt where they are common -- killings continue to take place among feuding families.
