The U.S. State Department released an annual report on the world situation with regard to religious rights. In respect of Azerbaijan, it reported pressure on members of non-traditional religious groups, such as the restriction of activities of the Jehovah's Witnesses community and a number of Muslim groups.
Representatives of non-traditional religious groups are faced with the pressure of the police, fines, secret trials and other forms of abuse.
" In Azerbaijan people are arrested for religion and there are restrictions on religious activities, including the distribution and sale of religious literature ", - the report says.
On May 12 in Ganja, a meeting of "Seventh-day Adventists" was dispersed and its members were fined.
In Baku, "the Blazing Sun" a religious publishing house, was closed and the employees arrested for 5 days.
In Hachmaz the police detained and threatened three Baptists, who conducted religious propaganda.
Azan (Muslim singing in mosques, calling people to prayer) is banned in a number of places. Several mosques remain closed - the Mosque of Martyrs, a Sunni mosque in Ganja and the mosque Fatima Zahra in the village of Yeni Guneshli. -03D06-
Politics
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Armenia is not against the dissolution of the OSCE Minsk Group, but does not consider it appropriate to discuss this issue now. "In the context of peace, we consider it possible to make a decision on the dissolution of the OSCE Minsk Group. When peace is an established fact, the existence of such a format may raise questions," Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said at a press conference today. "The whole question is about the timing, we need to understand how effectively and correctly to turn such topics into a subject of discussion right now," the Armenian Prime Minister added.
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He expressed his willingness to meet with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev at the border between the two countries. "A meeting with Ilham Aliyev could take place at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. I am open to such a format," Pashinyan said at a press conference today. According to Pashinyan, Armenia recently presented another proposal for a peace treaty to Azerbaijan.
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On August 31, Azerbaijan observes a "day of silence" before the Sunday’s early parliamentary elections for the unicameral Milli Majlis. All electoral campaigning is prohibited 24 hours before the voting. The early elections were initiated by the ruling Yeni Azerbaijan Party. This decision was motivated by the overlap of the scheduled elections in November with the global UN forum - the COP20 climate conference taking place in Baku.
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On August 30, at approximately 22:55, the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant in Metsamor was disconnected from the country's power grid, as reported by the Armenian Ministry of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure. The shutdown was caused by a lightning strike, which triggered the plant's safety systems to switch the station to a safe shutdown mode. Currently, the plant's staff is working on restarting the facility.
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