My personal blog, my thoughts.
On January 18, 1990, a group of US senators, including the future Secretary of State John Kerry, sent a letter to the USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev in connection with the pogroms of Armenians in Baku:
“We are deeply concerned about the killings, violence, and plunder of the Armenian population committed by groups of organized Azerbaijanis over the past six days.
Read more “Statement by US Senators on the Organized Massacre of Armenians in Baku, 1990”
These January days, Armenians around the world remember the victims of the Armenian pogroms in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, 29 years ago. For a whole week, from January 13 to 19, 1990, the Azerbaijani authorities organized and carried out mass pogroms of the Armenian population of the city. About a quarter of a million local Armenians were subjected to violence and deportation only because of their national identity, as a result there is no Armenian left in Baku now.
The immovable and movable property of thousands of Armenians was looted and taken away. According to estimates of various international organizations, about 500 Armenians became victims of the violence.
Read more “Azerbaijan must admit the guilt for Armenian pogroms”
Today’s European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) judgment in favour of an Azerbaijani journalist who faced a sex-tape smear campaign after investigating government corruption exposes the ongoing crackdown on freedom of expression in the country, Amnesty International said.
Read more “European Court ruling provides some justice for journalist who faced sex tape ordeal”
An Azerbaijani media-rights group has added its name to the list of organizations urging the government to release a hunger-striking blogger who was targeted with a new charge just weeks before his expected release from prison.
Members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), Human Rights Watch (HRW), and other watchdog groups, and The Washington Post’s editorial board have also demanded that 26-year-old Mehman Huseynov be freed.
Read more “Demands Mount For Hunger-Striking Azerbaijani Blogger’s Release Amid New Charges”
Mehman Huseynov, who was imprisoned in 2017 after posting incriminating photographs of properties he claimed were owned by government officials, was set to be released in March of 2019. However, new charges have been brought against him which carry a five to seven year prison sentence if found guilty.
Mustafa Hajibeyli, editor-in-chief of the bastainfo.com website, was summoned to the Baku prosecutor”s office as a witness in connection with a lawsuit. However, today he was transferred to the status of the accused. He is charged under the following Articles of the Criminal Code: 281.2 (appeals against the state), 309.2 (abuse of office) and 313 (official forgery).
“According to the accusation, I allegedly made anti-state appeals, deliberately misleading the public and spreading false information,” said Hajibeyli in an interview with Turan.
The former deputy of the Milli Majlis, the former head of the Press Service of the Ministry of Defense of the Azerbaijan Republic, Eldar Sabiroglu, published his Facebook status on his son’s page. He told how his son is being tortured in custody. His son Rufat Safarov has been deprived of his freedom for the third year. At the end of 2015, the investigator of the Zardab district prosecutor’s office, R.Safarov, made a bold and sensational statement about corruption and lawlessness in law enforcement, then resigned and was soon arrested, of course. The authorities do not forgive such statements.
Read more “Boomerang law. After all, life does not end tomorrow”
The noise that arose around civil activist Asi Khachatryan reached Azerbaijan. Tehran Bayramov in this country, infuriated compatriots threaten with cruel reprisals for photos of an Armenian girl
Read more “Azeri man, photographed with Asya Khachatryan, compatriots threaten reprisals”
Azad Hasanov, Musavat party member and political exile living in Lithuania, has been arrested during a short return to his home country and charged with drug trafficking.
According to his lawyer, Osman Kazimov, the Khatai District Court sentenced him to four months in detention on drug-related charges. Under Article 234.4.3 (illegal manufacturing, purchase, storage, transportation, transfer or selling of sale of drugs), Hasanov faces between five and twelve years in prison.
Ilham Aliyev, the President of Azerbaijan, has won the first ever Organized Crime and Corruption Person of the Year bestowed by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP). The award is given for the person who figured prominently in 2012 on stories on crime and corruption in its coverage area. Aliyev was chosen because of new revelations this year about how his family had taken large shares in lucrative industries including the telecom, minerals and construction industries often through government related deals.
The award is chosen by the 60 reporters and 15 news organizations that make up the OCCRP consortium. Runners-up included Albanian drug lord Naser Kelmendi, President of Uzbekistan Islam Karimov and Russian President Vladimir Putin.