Human rights activists announce new list of political prisoners in Azerbaijan

Baku/21.02.22/Turan: Today, the Union the Freedom of Political Prisoners of Azerbaijan today announced an updated list of political prisoners. The list was compiled by the director of the Institute for Peace and Democracy, Leyla Yunus, and the head of the Center for Monitoring Political Prisoners, Elshan Hasanov. It included 126 people, the Institute for Peace and Democracy said in a statement.

The compilers of the list proceeded from the criteria for the concept of "political prisoner" established by PACE. The previous list was made public on December 10, 2021 and contained 122 names.

The new ones on the list were Member of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA) Jafar Mirzoea and member of the political émigré organization "Choose a Democratic Azerbaijan" operating in Germany Pyunkhan Karimli.

In addition, the head of the Citizens and Development Party Ali Aliyev, who was sentenced to 5 months in prison on charges of slander, became a new political prisoner.

The Union recognized PFPA activist Shahin Hajiyev as another political prisoner, who was arrested on charges of drug trafficking. According to human rights activists, he is being persecuted for his posts on social networks on the Internet. 

Political prisoners are classified into 6 groups:

Group No. 1 - journalists and bloggers - 5 people

Group No. 2 - members of opposition parties and movements - 12 people

Group No. 3 - believers - 21 people

Group No. 4 - convicted in the Terter case - 27 people

Group No. 5 - convicted in the Ganja case - 47 people

Group No. 6 - life-sentenced - 14 people.—06D-