Letter to UNESCO

This letter is intended to remind UNESCO of the Turkish Government’s misuse of the Hagia Sophia Church-Museum in Constantinople this past July. As far back as 2013 I began to contact UNESCO when the Turkish government converted the historic and spiritually significant Hagia Sophia Church-Museum of Trebizond into a Mosque. I also visited UNESCO’s headquarters in Paris in 2015 to ask that protests be taken with the Turkish government in order to prevent the conversion of Hagia Sophia. It was obvious for as long as seven years previous to the Turkish governments infamous conversion of Hagia Sophia that Ankara had designs on converting Saint Justinian’s Church into a Mosque.

I would like to remind UNESCO that Turkey has also converted the the Church of the Savior of Chora into a Mosque. Outrageous as these actions are, it is still possible for UNESCO and other organizations to do the right thing. As a result of Turkey’s seizure of two Church-Museums that were on UNESCO’s own list of world heritage sites, your organization should call for the imposition of sanctions on Turkey owing to these outrages. Hagia Sophia in Greek means literally “Holy Wisdom”. Justinian’s Church means literally “The Church of the Holy Wisdom of God”. Hagia Sophia is specifically named for Christ himself the second person of the Holy Trinity and the incarnate “logos” (or word of God). 

Therefore, in the aftermath of the conversion of the Great Church (as those of us of Greek descent refer to Hagia Sophia) UNESCO should respond with wisdom. Considering Turkey’s endless list of crimes against humanity including genocide against Armenian, Assyrian, and Greek Christians, repression against the Kurds and many of its own Turkish dissidents, territorial expansion as with the case of Cyprus, and support for governments that sponsor terrorism and genocide as in the case of Ankara’s support for Azerbaijan, the opportunity is at hand for the civilized world to redeem itself for its long and inglorious tolerance of Turkish crimes against humanity. 

UNESCO should push the United Nations and the international community to impose sanctions on Turkey both for the seizure of former Churches Hagia Sophia and the Church of the Savior at Chora, as well as its past and present crimes against humanity that have become infamous. UNESCO considers itself to be in favor of human rights. The time is at hand to hold Turkey accountable for its actions. The desecration of the Hagia Sophia Church-Museum should have sent a loud and clear message to the world that Turkey is a pariah state. 

I am aware of the fact that UNESCO never made any protest against Turkish plans to convert Hagia Sophia into a Mosque until it was too much too late. It was only last July when Turkey fully intended to convert Hagia Sophia that UNESCO actually protested. Many years and opportunities to protest were wasted that might have made a difference in saving Hagia Sophia. In any case, UNESCO should seize the opportunity at hand to demand that international sanctions be imposed on Turkey in order to cripple this wicked and sinister government that pursues policies of aggression against United Nations members Greece and Cyprus, and that supports the aggression of the genocidal government of Azerbaijan against the peaceful and democratic Republic of Armenia and the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh.