Many residents of the historic city of Yazd are objecting to the growing number of religious shrines that the government is building there.

While protestors gathered outside the local branch of the Iranian Cultural Heritage Organization (ICHO) and local municipal offices, their spokesperson told an ICHO representative that the authorities were forcibly evicting people in order to expand the sites of local religious shrines.

Yazd is registered by UNESCO as an historic Iranian city, with many important landmarks. Many of those living in the old part of the town believe these would be destroyed if they agree to sell their homes to the government.

Earlier 260 students from Yazd University’s architecture faculty and a number of Isfahan University lecturers sent a letter to the city’s provincial governor, asking him to halt the gradual destruction of its cultural heritage.

Shahrzad News