Ankara ‘to inform UNESCO’ once Hagia Sophia museum is converted back into mosque

Turkey will inform the UN’s cultural body UNESCO about steps being taken regarding Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told state broadcaster TRT Haber on Monday.

On Friday, a Turkish court ruled that the sixth-century building’s conversion to a museum was unlawful and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared that it is now once more a mosque.

UNESCO said on Friday it would review the status of the monument as a World Heritage Site, following Erdogan’s enouncement. Hagia Sophia was a Byzantine church for nine centuries before the Ottomans converted it to a mosque.