President Erdogan declares iconic cultural site reopen to Muslim worship after a court ruling.
Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declared Istanbul's Hagia Sophia open to Muslim worship after a top court ruled that the building's conversion to a museum by modern Turkey's founding statesman was illegal.
"The decision was taken to hand over the management of the Ayasofya Mosque ... to the Religious Affairs Directorate and open it for worship," the decision signed by Erdogan said.
Erdogan had previously proposed restoring the mosque status of the UNESCO World Heritage Site, a focal point of both the Christian Byzantine and Muslim Ottoman empires and now one of the most visited monuments in Turkey.
"The cabinet decision in 1934 that ended its use as a mosque and defined it as a museum did not comply with laws," it said.
"There are dozens of people in front of Hagia Sophia museum. As soon as the court decision was announced ... they have been here chanting, they have been celebrating since then, and we spoke to them, they are very impatient to be able to pray inside Hagia Sophia," Koseoglu said.
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