Tourists visit the inside of Hagia Sophia on July 10, 2020, in Istanbul, before a top Turkish court revoked the sixth-century Hagia Sophia’s status as a museum, clearing the way for it to be turned back into a mosque. Ozan KOSE / AFPTurkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Friday that the Hagia Sophia, one of the architectural wonders of the world, would be reopened for Muslim worship as a mosque, sparking fury in the Christian community and neighbouring Greece.
“Like all our mosques, the doors of Hagia Sophia will be wide open to locals and foreigners, Muslims and non-Muslims.” For Greek Culture Minister Lina Mendoni, “the nationalism displayed by Erdogan… takes his country back six centuries.”“The concerns of millions of Christians were not heard,” Church spokesman Vladimir Legoida told Interfax news agency.
The move was also condemned by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom as an “unequivocal politicisation” of the monument. Shortly after the court decision, Erdogan signed a presidential decree handing over the administration of “Hagia Sophia Mosque” to Turkey’s religious affairs directorate known as Diyanet.
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