Tehran: A close aid of Iranian supreme leader Sayyid Ali Hosseini Khamenei, Ali Akbar Velayati, on Sunday praised Turkey for reopening the Hagia Sophia for Islamic prayers after a 86 year gap when it remained a museum. On July 24, Friday prayers were held inside the Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque after 86 years. Velayati also came down heavily on US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo''s for his recent comments urging Ankara to reconvert the Hagia Sophia into a museum.
"His ancestors converted all museums of the world into churches. The Hagia Sophia, which has been a mosque for 500 years, will remain as a mosque until the apocalypse," said Velayati. Ankara for its part has maintained that conversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque is Turkey''s internal matter. The Hagia Sophia, originally the church of Hagia Sophia was converted into a Mosque after Constantinople fell to the Ottoman empire in 1453.
In 1935 it was designated as a museum. Hagia Sophia a very popular tourist attraction was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in the year 1985.
|