The Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin has strongly condemned a recent statement by the Caucasus Muslims Office (CMO) that it says attempts to justify Azerbaijani authorities’ destruction of Armenian spiritual and cultural heritage in Artsakh, including the complete demolition of the Holy Mother of God Cathedral in Stepanakert.
In its statement, the Mother See stressed that the desecration, appropriation, or destruction of sacred sites cannot be justified under any political, administrative, or so-called legal pretext. It rejected as unacceptable the characterization of churches built during Artsakh’s period of de facto independence as “illegal structures,” arguing that their destruction under this reasoning represents a blatant violation of international principles on the protection of religious and cultural heritage and amounts to cultural genocide.
The Mother See also described as “manifestly unfounded and false” the CMO’s accusation that the Armenian Apostolic Church is obstructing the establishment of peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
According to the statement, peace is being undermined instead by the falsification of historical truth, the violation of the rights of forcibly displaced Artsakh Armenians, the appropriation of Armenian heritage in Artsakh, and the systematic erasure of Armenian traces in the region.
Etchmiadzin called on international religious and human rights organizations, as well as cultural heritage protection bodies, to take effective measures to stop what it described as a deliberate policy of destruction of Armenian cultural heritage by Azerbaijan.
The statement is part of a broader exchange between the Armenian church and the CMO over the destruction of religious monuments in Stepanakert.
In its recent statement, the CMO said the demolition of two churches in Stepanakert “cannot be considered a destruction of religious or cultural heritage,” arguing that the buildings were “illegal structures” and citing appeals from displaced Azerbaijanis for their removal. It also framed the criticism as politicization of the issue during ongoing Armenia-Azerbaijan normalization efforts and pointed to the preservation and restoration of certain Armenian religious sites in Azerbaijan as evidence of religious tolerance.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has refrained from directly condemning the demolitions, saying he does not expect the issue to be raised internationally at the state level for now and stressing the need to “fully understand” the situation. Government officials have largely avoided characterizing the destruction as systematic, with some arguing that international bodies rather than Armenia should address the issue.
Armenian media first reported in April that churches in Stepanakert—including the Church of St. Jacob and the Holy Mother of God Cathedral—had been demolished, reports later confirmed through satellite imagery and photographs. The cathedral, consecrated in 2019, had also served as a civilian shelter during the 2020 war.
Evidence of continued destruction of Armenian religious heritage in Artsakh has been emerging since the 2020 war and intensified after Azerbaijan’s full takeover of the region in 2023.
