Al-Kosheh rioters released

By Jailan Halawi
There were celebrations this week in Al-Kosheh village in the southern governorate of Sohag following the release of 89 of its inhabitants. They had been in custody for 11 months while being tried for their alleged participation in deadly sectarian clashes in their home village. On 6 December, the presiding judge of the Sohag Criminal Court ordered their release pending a verdict on 9 January.
The accused include 57 Muslims and 32 Copts. Before ordering the release, the judge asked the oldest man among the Muslim defendants to shake hands with the oldest Copt. They did not only do that, but they hugged each other too -- to cheers from the public assembled in the courtroom. Many defendants burst into tears at the news of their release.
All those accused of murder are Muslims. The Coptic defendants are charged with looting and attempted murder. At the opening of the trial in June, all the accused pleaded innocent.
The judge announced that his decision to release the defendants should not be taken as an indication of which way the verdict will go, but rather was strictly for humanitarian considerations. He was partly motivated, he continued, by the fact that the end of the holy month of Ramadan and Christmas will coincide in a few weeks.
Further, the judge said that after six months of hearings, he and his two colleagues on the bench needed time to deliberate.
"Among the detained, there are members of one family, such as a father and his two sons or three brothers; they are elderly and sick, and they have been detained for almost a year," the judge said. "In a few days, Egypt will celebrate the feasts that mark the end of Ramadan and Christmas. If the court has not been able to hand down verdicts by the end of the hearings, the accused should not have to suffer," he said.
A defence lawyer was quoted as saying that it was unprecedented for a judge to release such a large number of defendants, including many who are facing murder charges.
The Al-Kosheh riots erupted when a Muslim customer, Fayez Awad Hussein, was angered by a denial of credit during a visit to the shop of Rashed Fahim Mansour, a Copt. Hussein later returned to demand an apology, which apparently was not forthcoming. Both men quarrelled, and Hussein's two brothers afterwards arrived at the scene and allegedly began attacking Mansour's shop and other Christian-owned property. They allegedly also fired shots from guns in their possession, wounding three Christian passers-by.
The unrest spread to the nearby villages of Dar Al-Salam and Awlad Toq. The wide-scale rioting that followed resulted in the death of 20 Copts and one Muslim, as well as the looting and burning of at least 50 houses, shops and warehouses. Thirty-nine Copts and Muslims were injured. Hundreds of villagers were arrested.
Official statements denied that the riots were of a sectarian nature, and affirmed that the government deals with all citizens on an equal footing, regardless of their religious affiliation.
This was not the first occasion that Al-Kosheh, three-quarters of whose population of 30,000 are Coptic Christians, has found itself in the headlines. An investigation into the murder of two Copts in August 1998 received prominence because reports claimed that the investigation allegedly involved the physical abuse of several hundred of the village's Copts by police. The government denied the reports. The police officers accused of the atrocities were transferred to other posts.
Related stories:
Bad blood 8 - 14 June 2000
Kosheh indictment asserts 'secular' rioting 16 - 22 March 2000
Root solutions this time around? 20 - 26 January 2000
A no win situation 20 - 26 January 2000
'Poisonous soil' 6 - 12 January 2000
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