Khadija Ismayilova’s lawyer not allowed to meet his client
April 2, Ismayilova’s lawyer Yalchin Imanov was unable to see Ismayilova at the Baku Investigative Detention Center. The detention center cited a letter sent from the General Prosecutor for Serious Cimes.
Signed by investigator Senan Pasayev on March 12, 2015, the letter says charges pressed against Ismayilova (Articles 125, 179.3.2, 192.2.1, 213.1 and 308.2 of the Criminal Code) were all combined into one proceeding. Attorney Imanov however was taken off the case on December 28, 2014 as legal representative of Azadliq Radiosu.
Yalchin Imanov on the other hand says he signed a contract with Ismayilova’s family on March 17 as per another criminal case opened against her based on article 147.2 (slander) of the Criminal Code. He met Ismayilova at the detention facility on March 19 presenting the copy of the warrant.
Ms. Ismayilova was found guilty of the slander charge on February 23, and was fined in the amount of 2500manat. The decision was taken to the court of appeal by Ismayilova’s lawyer. The charge under the article 147.2 has nothing to do with the other charges pressed against the journalist by the General Prosecutor Grave for Serious Crimes. This is why preventing Mr. Imanove from seeing Ismayilova is absolutely illegal, baseless and violation of the right to protect.
Despite Imanov’s claims that the Detention Center’s decision was illegal, he was still unable to see Ismayilova on April 2.
Free Khadija Ismayilova
Arch Puddington, Vice President for Research at Freedom House writes on the case of Khadija Ismayilova. In her piece pubslihed March 30, Puddington says, "Why has the regime escalated its tactics from insults and slander to criminal prosecution? Part of the answer may stem from Ismayilova’s continued reporting on the sprawling and opaque business activities of the president’s two daughters—including their apparent links to Azercell, the country’s largest mobile telecommunications company. More broadly, the Aliyev regime has been suffering from an acute case of paranoia since former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych was forced from office by the Euromaidan protest movement. The Baku authorities now accuse the West, and the United States in particular, of using civil society groups as fifth-columnists bent on toppling the regime through a color revolution."
She adds, "During the Cold War, the political prisoner was often a person of international stature—think of Wałęsa, Havel, Sharansky, Bukovsky, Mandela. Pounding the table to obtain the release of prominent political prisoners was an embedded priority in superpower diplomacy. Even under super-realist Richard Nixon, the U.S. government pressed the Kremlin to release those sent to the gulag for “anti-Soviet activities,” often with success.
Today, few if any of the people jailed for working on freedom’s behalf—as a journalist, women’s rights advocate, student activist, or legal reformer—are household names, even in their own countries. But some certainly should be.
While the current reluctance of democratic governments to apply pressure over human rights issues is a global phenomenon, Azerbaijan has been especially adept at putting on a diplomatic charade to avoid criticism from Europe and the United States. It portrays itself as willing partner in the region, a critical alternative source of energy supplies, independent from Moscow’s influence, and free of the rhetorical flak and security problems emanating from neighbors like Turkey and Iran. In return, Baku expects its record of domestic repression to be ignored, even as its conduct increasingly resembles that of Russia, Belarus, or the Central Asian dictatorships."
Read the full piece here.
Khadija Ismayil Meets Her Family At Last
Its been over three months since Khadija Ismayil's arrest.
On December 5 Ismayilova was arrested on charges of "incitement to suicide".
She was not allowed to meet with the her family since her arrest. The head of the penitentiary facility was not giving any explanations for this decision despite a number of requests and inquiries.
On March 24, Ismayilova was finally allowed to meet with her family. In an interview with Meydan TV, the family of Ismayilova said she was in good spirits and that she congratulated everyone with Novruz Holiday.
On January 27 her sentence was extended by an additional two months.
On February 13 she received additional charges - appropriation, tax evasion, abuse of authority, and illegal business.
Her pretrial detention was extended again on March 6 by the Nasimi Court extended Ismayilova's pretrial sentence by two months until May 24.
Khadija's letters from prison
Khadija Ismayilova, continues to write from Kurdakhani detention facility on Azerbaijan's authoritarian regime, the European Games and the International Women's Day.
Here are some excerpts from her recent letters.
"I didn't become a journalist because of America, but U.S.-funded projects helped me to learn how to become a good journalist, to uncover corruption, and to tell the truth. Organizations funded by the EU and U.S. organizations organized trainings and I do have expectations from democratic institutions and countries.
I still do. Their inaction hurts, but I made it clear before I got arrested that I don't want any bargaining for me. Speak up publicly and loudly. No private diplomacy for me, please.
I don't believe in human rights advocacy behind closed doors. "Thanks" to the "privacy" of their efforts, the Council of Europe and OSCE helped the Azerbaijani government to silence all critics and create a false show of human rights.
I remember all of the investigations that I did, and I have no intention to demand support just because I was encouraged to become a skilled investigative reporter, which in fact is the main reason for my arrest [...]
I have spent three and a half months in detention waiting for one prosecution, which didn't work out. Now another one starts. Let us see if prosecutors will produce something smarter than they did so far [...]
Prison is not the end of life [...] It is in fact an unparalleled opportunity. I take it as a challenge to use the time for translating a book and writing."
In this letter Khadija paints the picture of female convicts. She writes of the most common criminal charges femal convicts face.
"In Azerbaijan, the two most common reasons which result in a prison sentence are the illegal circulation of narcotics in the south of Azerbaijan (article 234, also known as the "national article"); the victims of early marriages; and those who serve for crimes often occuring as a result of the lack of education.
About 20 years ago, we, journalists, covering these issues of the Southern Azerbaijan as well as early marraiges, should have been ready for these kind of consequences".
Khadija says today, the same problems exist not only in the South of the country but slowly are spreading across the whole country.
The law on Gender Equality was adopted in 2006 in Azerbaijan. The law on Domestic Violence was adopted in 2010. There are no official statistics on early marriages in Azerbaijan. A number of non-governmental organizations working on women's rights in Azerbaijan condemned the growing number of earliy marriages over the years as the government is yet to tackle this issue with more aggressive measures.