People's Republic of China has banned pork imports. Egypt On 29 April 2009, the Egyptian Government announced the decision to slaughter all pigs in the country, roughly 300,000, despite a lack of evidence that the pigs had, or were even suspected of having, the virus. This decision reportedly raised religious tensions since pig owners are mostly in the Coptic Christian minority (5% to 10% of the population) in the predominantly Islamic nation. Egyptian human rights lawyer Nadia Tawfiq claimed that the pig extermination was a form of attack on Christians. Many international newspapers attributed the action to the global swine-flu outbreak, even though no cases of swine flu had been reported in the country. According to the Egyptian Ministry of Health (MOH) the extermination was not based on either the swine flu outbreak, nor it is against a specific group of citizens. On the Elkahira Elyoum TV show, Dr. Hatem El-Gabaly announced the pig extermination was based on the fear that the bird flu could mutate in the unkempt pig herds. The decision was reached because so many of the areas used by pig growers are specifically trash dumps and do not follow any veterinary supervision, unlike most other countries that raise pigs in a tested and controlled environment. The extra attention and urgency by the emergence of the bird flu, then the swine flu, provided an opportunity to act on a plan that had been there for several years. Josep Domènech, the chief veterinary officer at the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) called the decision "a real mistake", saying that FAO had been trying to reach Egyptian officials but there has been no response. Egypt commenced the slaughter on 2 May 2009. This led to clashes between pig owners and the police in Cairo. On the next day in Cairo, an estimated 300 Coptic Christian residents of the Manshiyat Nasr district set up blockades on the street in attempt to keep government officers from confiscating their pigs, which led to clashes with the police. Al-Ahram, a widely circulated Egyptian newspaper, reported that owners of destroyed pigs will receive £E1,000 (approximately US$177.70) per animal in compensation, but Reuters reported that the issue was still "under discussion", citing an Egyptian cabinet spokesman. On June 5, the UK-based Compassion in World Farming organization warned Egypt that its brutal measures and its mass slaughter of pigs could negatively affect Egypt's tourism industry.