FILE PHOTO: A visitor takes a picture at Chora Museum or Kariye Mosque, one of the city's most celebrated Byzantine churches which was reconverted into a mosque in 2020 and re-opened its doors to visitors and worshippers after a four year-long restoration process, in Istanbul, Turkey, May 6, 2024. REUTERS/Umit Bektas/File Photo
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey has opened the ancient Chora church, one of Istanbul's most celebrated Byzantine buildings, to Muslim worshippers after it was used as a museum for more than 70 years, making it the second such major conversion under President Tayyip Erdogan.
Erdogan, a champion of pious Muslims in Turkey and head of a party with Islamist roots, turned Istanbul's world-renowned Hagia Sophia from a museum into a mosque in 2020 in a ceremony attended by tens of thousands of people.
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