U.S. Copts Association

Anglican leader says US policy harms Mideast Christians while Bush, Pope express worry over Iraqi Christians.
LONDON - Christians across the Middle East are being associated with Britain and the United States’ “global project” in the region and suffering as a result, the Archbishop of Canterbury warned Wednesday.

Archbishop Rowan Williams, the leader of the worldwide Anglican communion, told a conference in London that indigenous Christian communities in the Middle East were being perceived as “foreign and aggressive” because of British and American involvement in the region.

The United States led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003 respectively, both of which Britain also participated in.

“Indigenous Christian communities throughout the region have suffered from being associated with the American global project, and indeed the British global project as part of the American global project,” he said.

Citing his experiences from a recent visit to Syria, he added: “The military policies of the West in the last few years have firmly cemented in a great deal of the Middle East the notion that Christianity is a foreign, aggressive and Western presence.”

He said that people he had spoken to in the region had confirmed “the appalling pressure” on Christian groups in the Middle East.

“I regret it is a real tragedy that this ongoing crisis has yet to be the focus of policy declarations, or indeed recognised by some of our Western governments.”

Bush, Benedict XVI worry over Iraq’s Christians

Meanwhile, US President George W. Bush – who observers say is directly to blame for the worsening situation for Christians in Iraq in particular and in the rest of the region in general - and visiting Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday jointly expressed hopes for Middle East peace and concern about the plight of war-torn Iraq’s Christian minority.

In a joint statement released by the White House, the two leaders expressed “their common concern for the situation in Iraq and particularly the precarious state of Christian communities there and elsewhere in the region.”

Bush and Benedict XVI — making the second ever papal visit there, and first in three decades — also said they hoped to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the creation of an independent Palestinian state living side-by-side at peace with Israel.

And they expressed “their mutual support for the sovereignty and independence of Lebanon,” which is in the grips of a deadly political crisis.

“The Holy Father and the President expressed hope for an end to violence and for a prompt and comprehensive solution to the crises which afflict the region,” they said in the statement, which the White House made public.

The two leaders also “reaffirmed their total rejection of terrorism as well as the manipulation of religion to justify immoral and violent acts against innocents.

“They further touched on the need to confront terrorism with appropriate means that respect the human person and his or her rights,” they said.