HG Bishop Zosima, Bishop of Atfih, formed a legal team to attend on Tuesday at the Saf objection court, to defend the renewal of the remand of the copt imprisoned for 4 days for establishing a building , holding religious rites and managing a nursery without a license, even though the building is owned by the Diocese of Atfih, where religious rites have been held in it for 15 years.
The Bishop of Atfih held a closed meeting that lasted for more than two hours with the defense team to discuss the case and collect all documents that the building belongs to the Diocese in the name of St. Tadros Church and that Copt abdicated the building in favor of the Diocese and has no relation with it.
The defense team confirmed that the detention of this man was illegal and that there was no legal justification for his precautionary detention, as preventive detention is to ensure the maintenance of evidence in the criminal case and there is no investigation or evidence for this charges.
The defense team said that the attempt to mislead justice by denying the canonical status of the building was a legal transgression and an unacceptable attempt to extract the original right of the Copts of the village in their church where they used to pray. And already the Diocese had officially sought to legalize the building’s status under a 2016 law that laid down the rules for building churches which states that it is not permissible to close the building or prevent from practicing rituals.