Baku / 12.08.17 / Turan: The Monitoring Center for Political Prisoners strongly condemned the criminal investigation against the Turan News Agency on charges of tax evasion.

The human rights organization regards this as a prejudiced and politically motivated step.

“Turan Agency for many years of operation has established itself as a highly professional publication, whose entire activity is based on respect for law, impartial coverage of facts,” said the head of the Center Elshan Hasanov.

At the same time, the human rights activist pointed out that criminal cases on charges of non-payment of taxes are used as an instrument of pressure and persecution of many independent NGOs: their accounts are frozen, a ban on the departure of leaders of NGOs abroad and even the arrest of some of them is introduced.

“We believe that the measures taken against Turan are politically motivated. Recently, almost all independent websites were blocked in Azerbaijan, and the last opposition newspaper was stopped.

We former political prisoners appeal to representatives of the authorities and protest against pressure on the freedom of the press, in general, and on Turan Agency in particular, and we call for putting an end to this pressure,” the conclusion reads.

The Monitoring Center for Political Prisoners was established in October 2014 by a group of former “prisoners of conscience”