Baku Court of Appeal (BCA) suspends activity of website dia.az

The Baku Court of Appeal (BCA) suspended the website 14 dia.az  on November 14. This was reported to Turan by the head of the site, Mohammed Ersoy (Zamanov).

On November 3, the Media Development Agency filed a lawsuit to suspend the site's activities due to the fact that the site owner did not apply within the 6-month period as set forth in the law for registration in the Media Registry.

At the first meeting on November 14 the BCA satisfied the claim. According to Ersoy, he asked to postpone the meeting for 10 days due to health problems.

"However, yesterday a trial took place without my participation and this decision was adopted," he said as noting that he would file a cassation appeal to the Supreme Court.

Ersoy noted that the site will continue to operate. "I have already said that I am not a journalist. I am a blogger and dia.az not a website, but a blog. We will not suspend activities," he said.

An expert in the field of media law, Alesker Mammadli, in an interview with a Turan correspondent, said that the Law «On Media» does not regulate blogging.

However, if the court's decision comes into force, the site's activity may be suspended on the az domain.

In this case, the blogger can register on domains outside of Azerbaijan.

Another expert Khalid Agaliyev drew attention to the haste of the court's decision. For example, some sites have been unable to obtain court decisions for nearly a year on complaints about the refusal to include Media Registry.

“It is regrettable that in the judicial practice the strictest measures are applied to the media through formal meetings lasting 5-10 minutes. No matter what kind of media it is, they shouldn't be shut down so easily. This is a clear violation of the right to freedom of expression and the media," the expert said.

Note that dia.az  became the first website whose activity was suspended in accordance with the new Law «On Media».

Earlier, the head of the communications department of the Media Development Agency, Saida Safieva, responded to Turan's request that the agency was taking measures against media subjects provided for by the charter of this structure. These are media that grossly violate the Law on Media, she said, without specifying how many such media.

On October 14, 2022, the process of registration in the media register of Azerbaijani journalists and mass media began. Registration was conducted for 6 months and ended in April. Last year, the Media Development Agency stated that the legality of the activities of media entities that did not apply for registration would be considered by the court.

The new Law «On Media» was adopted on December 30, 2021 and entered into force after being signed by the head of state on February 8, 2022.

Add that the Law was criticized by independent media experts, many journalists, international structures, who noted that the document is aimed at restricting freedom of the press and speech.