Egyptian Copts protest over missing priest's wife

Nearly 7000 Egyptian Christians demonstrated on Sunday at the patriarchal headquarters in Cairo, accusing police of complicity against them after a priest's wife disappeared and was reportedly forced to convert to Islam.  The demonstrators, mostly young people, called on police to return the woman to her husband and family.  Father Philamon, the Orthodox Coptic priest in Abul Matamir, near the northern city of Alexandria, said that Wafaa Constantine, the wife of another priest in the town, had disappeared on November 27.  He said the 48-year-old woman worked as a government agricultural engineer and that one of her Muslim colleagues had kidnapped her and forced her to convert to Islam.  The priest charged that two similar cases had taken place in the town in the past six months.   Philamon accused Abul Matamir police of "pretending that Christians were converting to Islam of their own free will, which is false".  The demonstrators said they would maintain a sit-in until "police return the wife of the priest".
      CAIRO - Policemen cordoned off a cathedral in Cairo on Wednesday where Christian Copts have been protesting the alleged compulsory conversion of the woman. Riot police equipped with clubs deployed along the road leading to the cathedral where 500 Copts have staged a sit-in for four days urging the government to intervene to settle the issue.