Although a Turkish columnist criticized the opening of Akhtamar island’s Surp Khach church as “cultural genocide” due to its conversion to a museum, last year’s restoration of Van lake’s ancient Armenian church in eastern Turkey was an unprecedented event in a country where thousands of Armenian monuments have been either deliberately destroyed or neglected.

The one-year-old story of the reopening ceremony of the church is told in detail by VirtualAni in a post accompanied by photographs and speech transcripts.