Newly released satellite imagery has put to rest lingering questions over the fate of two historic Armenian churches in Khankendi, the city known to ethnic Armenians as Stepanakert, located in Azerbaijan’s disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. The visual evidence, published by Radio Free Europe, confirms early reports that both the Holy Mother of God Cathedral — a modern spiritual center consecrated only in 2019 — and the smaller Church of St. Jacob have been completely destroyed.
Initial claims of the cathedral’s demolition first circulated across Armenian media outlets back in April, sparking outrage among Armenian religious and political communities before the satellite confirmation. As the primary site of Christian worship for Khankendi’s longstanding Armenian population, the cathedral held deep cultural and spiritual significance for the local community.
The Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, the administrative and spiritual heart of the global Armenian Apostolic Church, was quick to condemn the destruction when reports first emerged. The institution accused Azerbaijan of a deliberate campaign targeting Armenian Christian sacred sites, framing the damage as part of a broader effort to erase traces of Armenian cultural and historical presence in the disputed region.
To understand the context of this development, Nagorno-Karabakh held a decades-long status as a majority ethnic Armenian enclave that was self-governed by the unrecognized Republic of Artsakh following the conclusion of the first Nagorno-Karabakh war in the 1990s. But in September 2023, a rapid military offensive by Azerbaijani government forces retook full control of the entire territory, bringing it back under Baku’s official rule consistent with international legal recognition of the area as Azerbaijani sovereign territory. The 2023 offensive triggered a mass exodus, with more than 100,000 ethnic Armenians — the vast majority of the region’s remaining Armenian population — fleeing across the border into the Republic of Armenia to escape the new governance.
Tensions remain high between the two neighboring states in the aftermath of the 2023 offensive, with the continued detention of Armenian separatist figures by Azerbaijani authorities serving as a persistent flashpoint that fuels widespread anger in Armenia. In line with standard journalistic practice, Middle East Eye reached out to both the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Azerbaijani Ministry of Foreign Affairs to request official comment on the confirmed church destructions, but neither side had issued a response by the time of this report’s publication.