Good afternoon, everyone. I welcome you to the 48th meeting of the Subcommittee on International Human Rights of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development. Today is October 2, 2012, and we are going to continue our study of the persecution of the Copt community in Egypt.
We have with us today two witnesses from the Department of Foreign Affairs: Mark Bailey, who is the director general of the Middle East and Maghreb bureau, and Andrea Gojevic, who is also from that division.
I'll turn the floor over to you, and once you're done we'll go to questions from the MPs. The amount of time for each question and answer round will be determined by how much time we have left available.
Please begin.