On March 13, 2018, the Public Defender appealed to the relevant agencies[1] with a recommendation to annul the decision on the transfer of theTandoyantsChurch to the Patriarchate of Georgia and to immediately suspend the reconstruction of the same monument of cultural heritage, as it was changing its appearance.

The TandoyantsChurch is a monument of cultural heritage located on Aghmashenebeli Avenue (No 28) in Tbilisi. The Georgian Eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Church has been asking for the transfer of the church together with other temples for a few years. In July 2017, LEPL Apostolic Autocephalous Orthodox Church of Georgia became the owner of the property and started reconstruction of the monument, which is essentially changing its appearance.

As a result of studying the case materials, it was established that the decision on the transfer of the property to the Georgian Patriarchate was made by the responsible agencies without examining important factual information about the case and reasonably justifying the decision, which can serve as grounds for invalidating the decision. Specifically, there is no evidence that would prove that the current ruins of the monument belong to the Georgian Patriarchate, while information available around the case indicates other circumstances about the ownership of the monument. Specifically, the registration card of the real estate of cultural heritage indicates that the monument confessionally belongs to the Armenian Church; there is an Armenian inscription on the wall of the monument referring to its Armenian builder, Kekel Grigoryan-Tandoyants, etc. In addition, the Public Defender focused on the necessity of preserving the appearance of the mentioned monument of cultural heritage. The recommendation emphasizes the problem of restitution of religious buildings confiscated from various religious unions, including the TandoyantsChurch, during the soviet period. As it has been repeatedly noted, the issue of restitution of the confiscated property remains unresolved for all religious unions, except for the Georgian Patriarchate.

The respondent agencies did not agree with the Public Defender’s recommendation. The position of the Ministry of Culture and Sport of Georgia, as well as the National Agency for Cultural Heritage Preservation of Georgia, is especially worrying. Although the recommendation emphasized the ongoing reconstruction of the monument and expected threats, and although they were even obliged to monitor the reconstruction, the agencies only referred to the issuance of a permit for conducting examination of the monument and did not check the fulfillment of the terms of the permit. The photos taken at the end of March 2018 show that a part of the building was dismantled, which apparently goes beyond examination, changes the appearance of the monument and damages its cultural value. It should be assessed negatively that the Ministry did not immediately suspend the reconstruction of the monument and did not made effective efforts to preserve the appearance of the monument, even though they were aware of the change in the appearance from the Public Defender's recommendation and the photo spread via social networks.