The fire, whose origin remains indefinite, is still raging in the Abu Sifine church in the popular district of Imbaba, frequented by Copts, the largest Christian community in the country and the Middle East.
Le Monde with AFP
At least forty -one people died and fourteen others were injured due to a fire that broke out on Sunday, August 14, in a church in Cairo, according to Coptic ecclesiastical authorities. The Egyptian Ministry of Health has identified fifty-five hospitalized people, without specifying the number of deaths.
This fire, whose origin has not yet been clarified, still rages, according to the authorities, to the Abou Sifine church in the popular district of Imbaba, named after the Holy Mercure of Caesarea, Reverée by Copts. The latter form the largest Christian community in the Middle East with some 10 million people (that is to say around 10 % of the Egyptian population).
“I have mobilized all the state services so that all measures were taken,” the president immediately reacted, Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, on his Facebook page, while a police source cited by the Associated Press agency mentioned the track of an electric short circuit.
The prosecution announced that it has opened an investigation and sent a team on site to establish the reasons for the start of fire, while the Ministry of Health said it had dispatched several dozen ambulances. Mr. Al-Sissi also announced that he “presented his condolences by phone” to Pope Coptic Théodore II (or Tawadros II), at the head of the Christian community in Egypt since 2012.
Burning fires are not uncommon in Egypt. In March 2021, at least twenty people had perished in the flames of a textile factory in the eastern suburbs of Cairo. In 2020, two fires in hospitals had cost the lives of fourteen patients with COVVI-19.
Although many, the Copts consider themselves away from many positions and deplore very restrictive legislation for the construction of churches and much more liberal for mosques.
The subject is sensitive and the activist Coptic of human rights Patrick Zaki recently spent twenty-two months in detention for “dissemination of false information” because of an article denouncing violations of the rights of Christians in Egypt.
Copts underwent the reprisals of Islamists, in particular after the overthrow by Mr. Al-Sissi in 2013 of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi with churches, schools and burnthed houses.
m. Al-Sissi, first Egyptian president to attend the Coptic Christmas mass every year, recently appointed and for the first time in history a Coptic judge at the head of the Constitutional Court.