DAVID ADAMS examines a new report concerning the dangers still facing Christians in Libya, five years after the overthrow of dictator Muammar Gaddafi…
Five years after the overthrow of dictator Muammar Gaddafi, the situation for Christians in Libya remains “very precarious”, according to a new report from persecuted church advocacy and support organisation, Open Doors.
The report, Libya: Freedom of religion in the land of anarchy, says that in addition to the “routine harassment and persecution” they faced under Gaddafi’s regime, Christians in Libya have been exposed to “very violent and deadly forms of persecution over the past few years” with the overall state of disorder in the wake of the 2011 revolution making life “very dangerous” for Christians.
The Syrian flag flying outside the UN in New York. A UN-backed peace process has led to the formation of a Unity Government which is cause for some optimism of an improvement in the situation facing Christians in the nation. PICTURE: UN Photo/Loey Felipe.
“The risk of being kidnapped, tortured or abused has been and is high for Christians in Libya. Christians have been sought out and targeted for dramatic and brutal treatment and execution.”
– Open Doors report
“The risk of being kidnapped, tortured or abused has been and is high for Christians in Libya,” notes the report, written by analyst Yonas Dembele. “Christians have been sought out and targeted for dramatic and brutal treatment and execution.”
The report says Christians have “little experience of security and freedom of worship and belief” in the North African nation but does express the hope that a UN-backed Unity Government formed in January this year will be able to assert more authority and restore law and order to the country.
“If this happens – even though it would not necessarily guarantee freedom of religion for Christians in Libya – such a state of affairs could help Christians become less vulnerable to the most egregious forms of persecution,” the report says. “However, in the long run, it will be the nature of the permanent political and constitutional order emerging from the current peace and transition process that will be the most decisive factor for the freedom of religion of Christians in Libya.”
The report quotes estimates that there were as many as 300,000 Coptic Christians and 80,000 Roman Catholics living in Libya before the fall of Gaddafi, with most of them foreigners who had come in search of work or as part of a attempt to reach Europe.
While, even under Gaddafi’s regime, it says Christians did not enjoy freedom of religion, it goes on to say that, despite this, each denomination was allowed a single place of worship in each city, Christians were legally permitted to worship in public and could even import Christian literature as long as it was not in Arabic.
And while their activity was closely monitored and any attempt at proselytisation was prohibited with the pressure on converts “enormous”, the “tight control” of the state on religious groups did accord Christians “a degree of protection from societal persecution and the threat from radical Islamic groups that would have been intense”.
Since the fall of Gaddafi, however, the report says the situation in the nation “could be likened to a Hobbesian state of nature where everyone seems to be in war with everybody else”. “What makes this state of affairs particularly nightmarish for Christians is the prominent role which violent Islamic groups like the IS [Islamic State] have been playing in the conflict.”
It says that among incidents of persecution targeting Christians between 2012 and 2015 was the apparent execution of seven Egyptian Christians, found dead in February, 2014, on a beach near Benghazi, the killings in December, 2014, of a Coptic couple working as doctors in Sirte, the abduction of 13 Egyptian Coptic Christians from a house in the same city in January last year and the abduction of 21 Christians by an affiliate of IS, perhaps including those abducted from Sirte, the same month.
It also lists attacks on Christian churches between 2012 and 2013, including the much reported attack on a war cemetery for British Commonwealth soldiers in Benghazi in 2012.
But the report notes that Christians are not only facing persecution from organised Islamic militant groups. “Christians face harassment and persecution in their everyday life from ordinary Libyans as well,” it says and quotes a 29-year-old Nigerian who recounts his experience in Libya: “I’ve had some scary interactions with men on the street…One day I was attacked because I was wearing a cross. The men said I should have covered it”.
“[T]here is a cause to be optimistic and to expect that atrocities perpetrated against Christians in Libya will come to an end or, at least, become increasingly less likely to happen.”
– Open Doors report
And while much of the international press has focused on the executions carried out by IS, the report says other militant groups, like Libyan Shield – one of the powerful militant groups based in eastern Libya, have also targeted Christians for “ill treatment and abuse”.
It quotes 26-year-old Amgad Zaki, an Egyptian Coptic Christian, who told AP of his ordeal at the hands of a militant group: “They shaved our heads. They threatened to sever our heads in implementation of Islamic Shariah (law) while showing us swords…They dealt with us in a very brutal way, including forcing us to insult our Pope Shenouda…I was taken to clean a bathroom, and the man pushed my head inside the toilet and sat on me…I was dying every day, and at one point I thought death is better than this”
The report concludes that the end of hostilities among the major armed factions and a decline in the intensity of the conflict following a UN-backed peace process which has led to the creation of a Unity Government last December has led to “cause to be optimistic and to expect that atrocities perpetrated against Christians in Libya will come to an end or, at least, become increasingly less likely to happen”.
“At the same time, there is reason for caution: Islamic militant groups will no doubt have much influence in the young Unity Government and in the process of creating a new and more permanent political order,” it says. “That brings with it the risk that a more permanent, institutionalized and state orchestrated form of persecution against Christians could become the new norm. The nature and content of the constitution that will be adopted in the transitional process could be very decisive in this regard.”
