Young writers demand termination of construction of restaurant near Kecharis monastery complex.

The participants of the 10th conference of young writers released a statement demanding that the construction of a restaurant complex near the Kecharis monastery complex be stopped. The statement addressed to Catholicos of All Armenians, prime minister, minister of culture, Kotayk governor and Tsakhkadzor mayor came after the group visited the site and was disappointed to hear the Armenian restaurant music coming from the partially built complex. The young writers believe the construction of a restaurant complex will noticeably devalue the historic significance of the cultural monument and may have negative impact on the general spiritual and moral environment of the territory. “We demand the construction be stopped and expect consistency from the bodies responsible for it,” the statement says. Kecharis is a 11-13th-century monastery, located 60 km from Yerevan, in the ski resort town of Tsakhkadzor in Armenia. Nestled in the Bambak mountains, Kecharis was founded by a Pahlavuni prince in the 11th century, and construction continued until the middle of the 13th century. The main temple, the church of Saint Gregory, is the monastery's first structure erected by Grigor Magistros Pahlavuni in 1003. The interior of the temple is divided into three spaces by two pairs of wall-attached abutments. The central (and largest) space of the church is crowned by a broad cupola resting on spherical pendentives. The cupola and pendentives were destroyed by an earthquake in 1927, and reconstructed in 2000.