Destruction of historical monuments in Azerbaijan. EU will monitor in September

A delegation led by Robert Palmer, Council of Europe Director for Culture, Cultural and Natural Heritage Tuesday visited Azerbaijan, where he announced that the Council of Europe’s Ministerial Cabinet will visit the region in September to assess the destruction of historical monuments in Azerbaijan .

Armenian monasteries in Iran added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List

The Armenian Monastic Ensembles in Iran, in the north-west of the country, consists of three monastic ensembles of the Armenian Christian faith: St Thaddeus and St Stepanos and the Chapel of Dzordzor. These edifices – the oldest of which, St Thaddeus, dates back to the 7th century – are examples of outstanding universal value of the Armenian architectural and decorative traditions.

Anti-Semitism in Azerbaijan/Part-2

 Two Synagogues Desecrated in Baku, Azerbaijan According to Alexander Rusetsky, the director of the Georgia Helsinki Group who went to Baku in February, two Baku synagogues were desecrated in the Fall of 1998. As the chairman of the synagogue of European Jews, Mikhail Bekker, told the Caucasus Bureau on the phone, the synagogue of European Jews was desecrated on October 17th in Baku,

ISLAMIC PROCESSES IN AZERBAIJAN

Religious processes in post-Soviet Islamic secular republics, including Azerbaijan, have their specificity. They considerably differ from analogical processes occurring in other regions where Islam is traditionally spread and where Islamic institutionalism has deep historical roots.

In the Soviet period, being deprived of social-political role, Islam in Azerbaijan was reduced to traditional and everyday functions. After independence was gained the role of Islam was overestimated: it became one of the component parts of Azerbaijani identity. Great number of old and new mosques and religious schools (madrasah) were opened, was formed a strata of people who got education in well known foreign Islamic centers. Were restored Islamic holidays, the propaganda of Islam was raised to the governmental level. Islam was considered to be a most important value by the state and was underlined unique, national character of Azerbaijani Islam. State-religion relations were regulated by certain laws, and a regulation about the freedom of religion was adopted in the constitution. Pilgrimage of the president Heydar Aliyev to Mecca in 1994 grew the importance of religion in the country.