https://www.christiandaily.com/asia...stian-sites-heritage-in-nagorno-karabakh.html
Azerbaijan is guilty of “cultural genocide” for destroying Christian sites in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and falsely claiming that Armenian religious presence there never existed, according to a report by a legal advocacy group.
The European Centre for Law & Justice (ECLJ)’s report lists eradication of “churches, monasteries, khachkars [cross-stones] and other cultural artifacts that tell of the faith and culture of the Armenian people.”
Azerbaijan gained control of the majority of Nagorno after the Second Karabakh War, September 2020 to November 2020. Dozens of Armenian Christian heritage sites in Nagorno-Karabakh were destroyed, damaged, or closed to the public during that period, according to the June report, “The Systematic Erasure of Armenian Christian Heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh.”
There are now 500 sites under Azerbaijan’s control, with 6,000 Armenian monuments, the report states. Foreign observers are banned from the sites, but satellite surveillance has revealed the destruction.
Churches damaged or destroyed, as listed in the report, include Meghretsots Holy Mother of God Church, the seventh-century Vankasar Church in Tigranakert, St. John’s Cathedral of the Mother of God in Stepanaker, and Ghazanchetsots Cathedral in Shushi, defaced with “multiple religious symbols… removed from the church, including the unique angels on the building’s gate, the domes of the church, and the cathedral’s cross.”
Under the pretense of renovation, the Azerbaijani government vandalized the Surb Sargis Church, built in 1279 in Tsar village of Karvachar, according to the report.
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