Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev was recently in Washington D.C. where he spoke at the World Summit in Defence of Persecuted Christians.
Throughout the Middle East, secular leaders who protected the rights of all peoples, including Christians, have been replaced by a combination of weak governments who cannot protect anyone, radical Wahhabist style forces and in some cases, outright chaos. In each case, the anti-Christian regimes have come about after the western sponsored violent overthrow of previous governments who protected Christians.
Metropolitan Hilarion described the situation where after a leader is accused by the west of being ‘undemocratic’,
“The regime is overthrown in the name of democracy, but instead of democracy… political chaos comes”.
He continued, discussing the situation in Iraq and Libya where innocent Christians have been the victims of new realities which are shaped by radical terrorists
“This is precisely the situation that is used by terrorists to gain control of huge territories. This happened in Iraq, this happened in Libya…
In Iraq under Saddam Hussein there were 1.5 million Christians, now there is probably one tenth of this quantity left and even those who are left are in constant danger. In Libya there was a strong Christian community, there is practically none of it left”.
Metropolitan Hilarion lamented America’s role in the Middle East as one which has killed and displaced thousands of Christian civilians.
During his time in the US, he spoke with Vice President Mike Pence. Metropolitan Hilarion told Pence,
“If there are several anti-terrorist coalitions which are fighting against one another, then the problem will remain and this is precisely what terrorists want. If the countries [are] able to set their political differences aside in order to act as allies in one anti-terrorist coalition, then it would be possible to win over terrorism”.
READ MORE: Orthodox Christians see Russia as the defender of their faith
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