Hoping for an international support in a more agile and participative manner, Azeri civil society representatives urge the US government and human rights watchdogs "not to abandon them," at the time when Baku leans on foreign-funded NGOs.
RasulJafarov, Baku-based Human Rights Club, visited Washington DC last week, to discuss possible cooperation and the ongoing crackdown against civil society members in Azerbaijan.
"We brought up various offers during our dialogs and some of them need to be discussed. For example, working with the residents of Azerbaijan's regions, preventing the government's access to foreign donors, as well as helping civil society to create their private offices for launching the events," he said in an interview with TURAN's Washington correspondent.
The civil society in Azerbaijan is "under attack particularly because they speak out on the topics that the government wants to be forgotten," Jafarov emphasized.
In Washington, he said, there is a "huge interest" towards Azerbaijan "in all spheres, from arrests of human rights activists to media and political atmosphere".
He was able to discuss these topics with Washington-based rights groups and government bodies, such as the State Department, Congress Committees, Senate Foreign Relations office as well as several NGOs and possible donors.
Politics
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Adalyat Verdiyev, the head of the civil defense staff at the public legal entity Center for Public Health and Reform under the Ministry of Health, and a military expert, has been arrested. On November 22, during a media tour to the liberated territories, Verdiyev filmed and published information and images on his social media accounts revealing Azerbaijani Armed Forces' combat positions in the heights, deployment sites, coordinates, and operational conditions of the border troops. This disclosure caused significant damage to the interests of state security and defense capability. This was stated in a report from the General Prosecutor’s Office.
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On Monday, the Baku Appeals Court considered the appeal of Talysh researcher Iqbal Abilov against the extension of his detention for another four months. The defense argued that the decision to extend Abilov's detention was unjustified, lawyer Fariz Namazly told reporters.
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"Black Monday in Georgia: Police and special forces guard the doors behind which the 'slaves of Georgian Dream' are destroying our Constitution and mocking our Parliament." This is how Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili commented on the convening of the new parliament on Monday, which is not recognized by the opposition.
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Well-known Georgian activist Samira Bayramova was prevented from leaving the plane in Yerevan. She was on a WAW airline flight bound for Tbilisi, but due to bad weather, the plane made an emergency landing in Yerevan. In a post on her Twitter account, Bayramova (an ethnic Azerbaijani) wrote that border guards told her, "Your nationality is a problem."
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