Baku / 05.11.18 / Turan: The Beylagan court gave the editor-in-chief of the kriminal.az website, Anar Mammadov, which was blocked within the country, 10 days. During this time, the journalist must pay compensation for civil defamation. Otherwise, the journalist may be convicted for failure to comply with the court decision.
According to Anar Mammadov, the website he runs was fined several months ago on the basis of a lawsuit by teacher Gulnar Yusifova, who works at a school in the village of Tazakend, Beylagan District.
"Information about this teacher was spread on ajan.tv news website in September 2016. Non-news websites also spread this information. Information that generated a great public response, was posted on kriminal.az on October 10 with reference to the source. After a few months the teacher sued not the source, but kriminal.az and four more sites that disseminated the information and demanded that these websites be fined. The lawsuit was satisfied by the Beylagan court. The plaintiff obliged the five websites to pay her 40 thousand manat.
Complaints against the decision of the district court were not satisfied either by the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court.
The law "On Mass Media" clearly states that a journalist and the editors of the media are exempt from liability if they publish something with reference to material distributed by other sources. However, none of our courts take this into account. This decision has already been submitted to the European Court of Justice.
"The Beylagan court sent a warning. It says that within 10 days the fine must be paid, otherwise I may be convicted for non-compliance with the court decision."
Anar Mammadov also said that he was unable to pay the fine, since his only source of income, the website he runs, has been blocked in the country for several months now.
What is the penalty for non-compliance with court decisions?
Azerbaijan criminalizes non-execution of judicial acts. According to Article 306 of the Criminal Code, the lightest punishment for deliberate non-execution of a court decision that has entered into force is a fine of 2 to 4 thousand manat. The most severe punishment provided for in this article is imprisonment for up to three years.
Anar Mammadov posted on his website materials relating to the attempted assassination of Ganja city"s chief executive Elmar Veliyev this summer. Law enforcement authorities saw appeals against the state in these articles. At the same time, a criminal case was initiated under three articles of the Criminal Code: 214-2 (open call for terrorism), 281.1 (open call directed against the state) and 313 (spreading false information in news resources). The website kriminal.az at that time was accused of disseminating provocative information "confusing the public."
In July, Anar Mammadov, his wife and father-in-law were interrogated at the Baku city prosecutor's office. Following this, the entrance to the website criminalaz.com was blocked. -0-
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