Turkey says Diyarbakir Armenian church won't be closed down

PanARMENIAN.Net - Turkey’s Ministry of Environment and Urban Planning said in a statement that the churches in Diyarbakir’s Sur district will be restored to their original condition, the Armenian Weekly reports.

Istanbul’s Turkish-Armenian Agos newspaper said that the Ministry also announced that they are not considering using the churches “for any other purpose.”

According to Agos, ethnic-Armenian Member of Parliament from the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Garo Paylan brought this decision to the parliament and asked the Ministry of Environment and Urban Planning about the grounds for expropriation and the future of the churches. The Ministry responded to Paylan’s question and said that the churches would not be closed down and that “destroying the cultural heritage in the region is out of question.”

A list of lands and buildings in the Sur district—including the Surp Giragos Armenian Apostolic and the Armenian Catholic churches—were expropriated by the Turkish government in March. An “urgent expropriation” cabinet decision was taken regarding 6,300 plots of land, citing the March 25 issue of the Official Gazette of the Republic of Turkey, the country’s official journal that publishes new legislation and official announcements. The Surp Sarkis Chaldean Church, the Virgin Mary Ancient Assyrian Church, and the city’s Protestant church were also reportedly expropriated.

Armenian Weekly contributor and member of the Surp Giragos Church reconstruction project Raffi Bedrosyan said there will be a strong effort to reclaim the lands. “All legal and political channels will be mobilized within Turkey and internationally to stop this legalized robbery,” Bedrosyan told the Weekly in March.

On Feb. 14, reports emerged that the Armenian Catholic Church of Diyarbakir had suffered extensive damages during clashes between Turkish armed forces and Kurdish militants. A series of images depicting the extent of the damage to the church were posted on the “Armenian Church Surp Giragos and Surp Sarkis in Diyarbakir” Facebook page.