Cii News & Agencies – Two Coptic Christian boys have been put in juvenile detention in Egypt after locals accused them of tearing out pages of the Holy Quraan and urinating on them, in the latest anti Islam act that has somewhat trend in current times. Only this time the anti Islam acts were performed by minors.

This is the latest in a series of legal cases in Egypt against alleged contempt of religion.

The new case is a rare instance of minors being accused. The boys, ages 9 and 10, were detained Tuesday in a southern town, to be held for 15 days while prosecutors investigate the accusations.

The incident with the two boys took place in the village of Ezbet Marco in the southern province of Beni Suef. Residents say they saw the boys bring pages of the Quran behind a local mosque and urinate on them.

Some reports say residents of the village and reporters said a passerby had seen the children ripping up pages of a copy of the Holy Quraan and urinating on it in front of the local mosque.

The passerby took the two boys to the local priest to condemn them for the incident, the residents said, but he was not satisfied with what he viewed as the priest’s insufficient reprimand and decided to file a complaint to the police.

Police arrested the boys and a crowd of angry residents gathered outside the police station. Fearing violence, security forces have surrounded the village and the boys were taken to a juvenile detention facility.

Cii News & Agencies – A Local Imaam, Sheik Gamal Shamardal Shamardal who is head of the local branch of Gamaa Islamiya, insisted the two boys could not have acted alone and said they must remain in custody until they confess who incited them. That was the only way to calm offended Muslims, he said.

“An apology is not acceptable,” said Shamardal. He speculated over a wider conspiracy behind the incident, ranging from the local priest to Coptic Christians living abroad.

The priest, he said, refused to discipline the children when told of the incident, forcing the residents to turn to the authorities. “He just dismissed it as children’s play,” Shamardal said. “But this feels like it was arranged” to incite religious anger.

“There was a lot of anger particularly with the circumstances the country is going through after the film,” he said. “It was like spilling oil on fire.”

Local security chief, Attiya Mazrou, says the boys were caught with the tarnished pages of the Quran with them, but no one saw them urinate it. “They could have found them that way. We don’t know. No one saw them do it,” he said. The boys are to appear before prosecutors again Sunday.