Khadija Ismayilova's Sentence Suspended After Supreme Court Decision

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.

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 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.