The Times releases article on Armenian church at risk in Diyarbakir

YEREVAN, JANUARY 11, ARMENPRESS. The British The Times released an article about the ancient Armenian church of Surp Giragosin Diyarbakir describing how the explosions blew out the windows of the building and echoed through the narrow streets. “Armenpress” reports that The Times journalist Hannah Lucinda Smith talked with the caretaker of the ancient Armenian churchGaffur Turkay.

Surp Giragos, was closed during the Armenian genocide of 1915 and reopened in 2011. Mr Turkay has been unable to reach the church to check the damage since the curfew began.

The author of the article notes that the Armenians in southeast Turkey are descendants of survivors of the 1915 genocide.

“It is a chapter that continues to traumatise and divide the country. Most of the killings were carried out by Kurdish soldiers on the orders of Ottoman generals, although many Armenian children were sheltered by sympathetic Kurdish families, and then raised as Muslims.”

It is said in the article that in recent years, as the grandchildren of those converts have rediscovered their roots, they have chosen to return to Christianity.