The editor-in-chief of the site Aztoday.az appealed to the head of state

Baku / 14.09.18 / Turan: Editor-in-chief of Aztoday.az website, Elmidar Aliyev, appealed to the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev with a request to ensure his protection. In his appeal he said in recent days unknown persons are following him. "According to information from reliable sources, security forces have agreed on my arrest on trumped-up charges," writes Aliyev. He further points out that as the head of the site and citizen, he has always placed the interests of the state above all else and will not henceforth retreat from it.

E.Aliyev also notes that, the reason for the pressure on himself considers his activities "to expose the structures and officials that damage the interests of the state." He believes that he was angry with the oligarchs who trampled on the laws, and faced a threat of a new provocation against him. Among those he names the head of SOCAR Rovnag Abdullayev. Earlier, on September 6, E. Aliyev stated that as a result of massive Ddos attacks his site AzToday.az was destroyed.

At the same time, he noted that AzToday.az had previously been subjected to hacker attacks, and each time it happened after the publication of critical articles about SOCAR.

The current attack followed the publication of information about the detention in Armenia at the request of the US Kamal Oksuz, who was convicted of organizing trips to Azerbaijan in 2013 for US congressmen financed by SOCAR, and Democratic party's demands to file a lawsuir against the president of the state oil company Rovnag Abdullayev.

According to Aliyev, AzToday.az in November 2017 was blocked on the territory of Azerbaijan by the order of, as he believes, Azerbaijani presidential aide Ali Hasanov. In May the site was unblocked. -06D--