SOCAR vice president wants to condemn blogger

Baku/22.06.21/Turan: A preparatory meeting was held in the Agsu District Court on the claim of SOCAR Vice President Mikayil Ismayilov against blogger Elshan Alisoy.

Ismayilov demands to condemn Alisoy under the Article 147 (slander) and 148 (insult) of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan. Hearings on the merits are scheduled for June 25.

Alisoy told Turan that he shared an article on his Facebook page: "The Dark Empire of Mikayil Ismayilov", published on May 18 on the website azadsoz.com (Azərbaycanın yeni “Kəmaləddin” i Mikayıl İsmayılovun qaranlıq imperiyası - Azad söz (azadsoz.com) writing a comment to it:

“Lord, why do they need so much wealth ... Mikail Ismayilov is one of the 12 vice-presidents of SOCAR. I call it gluttony and barbarity. "

“After this comment, Ismayilov filed a lawsuit to bring me to criminal responsibility. In addition, he initiated a civil suit and wants to recover 100 thousand manats from me for moral damage,” the blogger noted.

His lawyer Neimat Karimli said that at the preparatory meeting, the plaintiff's representatives filed a motion to hold the process behind closed doors.

“I opposed. For to conduct the process behind closed doors, there must be grounds, and the subject of the proceedings does not apply to them. We are not talking about state secrets, military secrets, family or commercial secrets,” Karimli said.

However, the judge Anar Askerov, having satisfied the petition of the plaintiff's representatives, decided to hold the trial behind closed doors.

According to the lawyer, the very acceptance of the claim into proceedings is illegal. “According to Article 60 of the Law on Mass Media, a person who reprints an article published in another media outlet is not responsible. An article about Mikail Ismayilov was published on the website azadsoz.com, and Elshan Alisoy posted it on his Facebook page. He just commented on the article. The article was about the misappropriation of state property worth millions. Alisoy considered it "undesirable" and "savagery" for a state official to have such a state. Despite the contradiction of the lawsuit with the law, the judge took it into proceedings." --03D06-