PACE committee shocked by severity of sentence on Azeri human rights activist Rasul Jafarov

The Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) has condemned the conviction of Rasul Jafarov, a prominent Azerbaijani civil society activist, and said it was shocked by the severity of the sentence – 6.5 years of imprisonment – pronounced upon him by the Baku Grave Crimes Court on 16 April 2015.

“Mr Jafarov is well-known to the Council of Europe and took part in a number of side-events organized during part-sessions of the Assembly,” said the committee in a statement. “He was the founder and leader of the Human Rights Club and co-ordinator of the campaigns ‘Sing for Democracy’, prior to the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku in 2012, and ‘Sport for Rights’, prior to the European Games starting next June.

Mr Jafarov was convicted for ‘tax evasion’, ‘abuse of powers’ and ‘conducting illegal business’ in relation to his activities as a NGO leader and human rights activist. During the trial, many procedural shortcomings, including violations of the right to defence, were reported by international monitors.

The committee finds that Mr Jafarov’s sentence is not proportionate to the offences imputed to him and appears to constitute a political retaliation for his activities and his co-operation with international institutions. The committee notes that the Baku Grave Crimes Court’s judgment is not final.”

A complaint concerning Mr Jafarov’s arrest is pending before the European Court of Human Rights; the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights made a third party intervention in his case: