Diyarbakır

Some 5,000 people attended a four-day "sky observation festival" held in an ancient castle in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır.

People monitored the sky and the stars with high tech telescopes in Zerzevan Castle, which was added to the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List in 2020.

Following seven years of renovation work, St. Giragos Church in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır is now open to offer religious services once again.

The church, heavily damaged by PKK terrorists in 2015, was reopened with a ceremony attended by Turkish Culture Minister Mehmet Nuri Ersoy.

With the pandemic weakening, tourism professionals in Turkey's southeastern region are hopeful of witnessing a tourism boom this year, expecting an influx of both local and international tourists.

According to a feature story in daily Milliyet on April 21, the occupancy rate in region's hotels is around 90 percent as of April.

Turkey's southeastern province of Diyarbakır has set its sights on becoming the regional champion of tourism, appealing to international visitors with its history, culture and culinary scene.

Historic caves in Turkey's southeastern province of Diyarbakır's Lice are on the way to becoming a tourism attraction hub after living under the shadow of terrorism activities for decades.

Local authorities took the first concrete step to increase the awareness of the Birkleyn Caves, a hidden natural beauty that is believed to have 8,000 years of history.

Turkey's prominent poet, writer and intellectual Sezai Karakoç passed away on Nov. 16, the country's presidential spokesperson announced on social media. He was 88.

A badge found in Turkey's southeastern province of Diyarbakır during the excavations at the 3,000-year-old Zerzevan Fortress that was used as a "military settlement" during the Roman Empire, aroused curiosity.

A farmer who grew a watermelon weighing 45.5 kilograms has won the 11th Watermelon Festival organized in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır, famous for its big and juicy watermelons.

"Due to drought, unfortunately, this year farmers could not grow bigger watermelons," Münir Karaloğlu, the governor of the province, said at the prize-giving ceremony on Sept. 22.

Archaeological teams in Turkey continue excavations in the Çayönü mound, a Neolithic settlement where traces of settled life and production are observed.

The excavations in Çayönü, in the southeastern Diyarbakır province, began in 1964, but they were halted in 1991 due to security reasons. The work has resumed in 2017 with a team led by Aslı Erim Özdoğan.

A total of 782 hand grenades dating back to the World War I era were found during archaeological excavations at the historical site in southeastern Turkey.

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They were found in Amida Mound, or Amida Höyük - known as the heart of Diyarbakır province - which is located in the historical Sur district.