A subcommittee of the SFRC held a hearing on the funding requests for the Human Rights and Western Hemisphere bureaus at State. Sen. Cardin used the opportunity to ask Tom Malinowski about Khadija:
“I want to move on to a tragic situation in Azerbaijan. We are seeing an increase in the number of political prisons in that country and their oppression against those who differ with the government. One of those cases is Khadija Ismaylova, a political prisoner and Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty reporter, is currently serving seven and half year sentence in Azerbaijan on charges many human rights organizations regard as politically motivated. She has been a tireless reporter on corruption in the country and is widely believed that she was targeted for her work. Could you just comment as to what diplomatic tools we have available in order to raise this issue?”- asked Cardin.
Tom Malinowski answered: “Well I would say first of all that we have called and will continue to call for the release of Khadija Ismayilova. We are very well aware of her case. In the last several weeks we have engaged very intensively with the government of Azerbaijan on human rights issues. It has I think contributed to actions by the government of Azerbaijan to release a number of people who we consider to be political prisoners, including Intigam Aliyev, an internationally recognized human rights lawyer, Rasul Jafarov, Anar Mammadli who was the chairman of their election monitoring and democratic elections center. We have seen some, I think, very positive steps by the government of Azerbaijan in response to our engagement but we would certainly agree with you that the good news that we have seen is not yet enough and there are still others in detention who should not be, including Khadija Ismayilova, and we feel very strongly that releasing the remaining political prisoners and more broadly expanding freedom of expression and freedom of the press in Azerbaijan would be good for that country’s future and good for our relationship with Azerbaijan”. -0-
Politics
-
"A group of hydrologists and engineers from Azerbaijan and Armenia, with our active support, is working together on a comprehensive water management scheme for transboundary rivers," the U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan, Mark Libby, wrote on the U.S. Embassy's social media account on November 12.
-
As the Biden administration draws to a close, Secretary of State Antony Blinken is headed on an emergency trip to Brussels to discuss how to support Ukraine with European allies.
-
The Prosecutor's Office is investigating the deaths of two people during the recent floods in Baku, Baku Mayor Eldar Azizov said commenting on the consequences of the flooding of tunnels in the capital during the heavy rains on October 22 to journalists. According to him, the sewer system could not handle the large volume of floodwater, which led to the drowning of two people in a tunnel in the Sabunchu district of Baku. The floods revealed vulnerabilities in Baku's water infrastructure.
-
The United States is ready to assist all countries, including Azerbaijan, in the transition to renewable energy sources, the U.S. National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi said at a briefing at COP29, in response to a question from Turan about how the U.S. could support Azerbaijan in moving from oil and gas to clean energy.
Leave a review