January 5 will be the 10th day of the hunger strike of blogger, chairman of the Institute for Reporters Freedom and Safety (IRFS) Mehman Huseynov, who was moved from the jail N14 to the detention center under medical control. Mehman is on a hunger strike to demonstrate a protest against the authorities' intention to initiate a second lawsuit against him; he was not released on the first criminal charge. Human rights activists call both lawsuits illegal and aiming at punishing a blogger for his political position. Mehman denies his guilt in both conflicts.
Leading opposition parties in Azerbaijan called on the authorities to release Mehman, calling his conviction illegal. On January 3, a small group of activists, mainly from the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan, held a protest action near the Neftchilar metro station. The action was quickly dispersed by the police, the participants were detained, and the next day four women and one man were sentenced to pay fines (300-400 manat), the rest of the men, including journalists covering the event, were sentenced to 21-22-day administrative arrest.
Among the detainees were civil activist and blogger Fatima Movlanly, who conducted a single protest picket at the 28 May metro station on the third day of Mehman Huseynov"s hunger strike. Then she managed to escape safely.
Three politicians and civil activists are on a hunger strike in solidarity with Mehman Huseynov. On January 3, a PFPA activist Tofig Mammadov began a hunger strike in solidarity with Huseynov. On January 4, the member of the Musavat Party, a former political prisoner Tofig Yagublu and the head of the Political Prisoners Monitoring Center Elshan Hasanov joined the hunger strike.
The "Huseynov case" caused a response from the international community, with each passing day the foreign reaction intensifies.
US Senator Marco Rubio called on official Baku to immediately release the blogger. "Azerbaijani blogger Mehman Huseynov remains in custody on a falsified charge. He is now in a critical situation due to the hunger strike. The Azerbaijani government should release him immediately," the senator wrote in his blog on Twitter.
The co-rapporteurs of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on monitoring Azerbaijan, Sir Roger Gale (UK, EU) and Stefan Schennach (Austria, SOC) expressed their deep concern about the new charges against the Azerbaijani blogger, who fights against corruption and the IRFS chairman, Mehman Huseynov. "... there are reasonable grounds for assuming that these new charges are clearly politically motivated and clearly intended to silence the well-known human rights activist, whom we consider to be political prisoners,", said the co-rapporteurs. "In addition, we are concerned by the fact that Mehman Huseynov went on a hunger strike as the only way for him to protest against his plight. We call on the Azerbaijani authorities to consider his case as an absolute priority," they concluded.
"The escalation of the prosecution of Mehman Huseynov just a few months before his release is an inhuman step, reflecting a desire to suppress dissenting voices in Azerbaijan," said Karin Deutsch Karlekar, director of PEN America, which brings together journalists and writers in the United States.
The office of UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guteres, has been informed about the case of the convicted blogger. The general secretary was informed about the difficult situation of the blogger who went on a hunger strike and the authorities' attempt to condemn him on a false charge for a new term. Guteres was asked to take the necessary steps to save and protect the blogger, Turan agency has learned from informed sources in international human rights structures.
Earlier, similar appeals were made to OSCE Representative on Press Freedom, Harlem Dezir, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Dunje Miyatović and EU Commissioner for Enlargement, Jonass Hans. The aforementioned figures were asked to raise with the Azerbaijani authorities the issue of the inadmissibility of the prosecution of Mehman Huseynov and the removal of false accusations from him.
The leader of the Azerbaijani opposition party REAL, Ilgar Mammadov, who also appealed to international leaders for support in defending Huseynov, complained about the slowness of decision-making in the Council of Europe.
Every day the number of international organizations and politicians involved in the protection of a blogger is growing; and every day the health of Mehman deteriorates. Through the efforts of prison doctors and at the request of his political émigré brother, he was put out of the dry hunger strike, as irreversible, fatal changes began in his body, but continues the hunger strike, declaring its reluctance to put up with an unfair new accusation.
On Monday, the Azerbaijani authorities will learn about new, harsh statements by the international community, other activists may join the hunger strike in solidarity with the blogger. And if the blogger is not released and terrible things happen to him, then the country will face the next danger of imposing sanctions against Azerbaijani high-ranking officials. The way out of the situation in which the authorities have driven themselves is to abandon the intention to leave the blogger for a second term on the second dubious and obviously politically motivated criminal charge. If Mehman stops the hunger strike and is released, and his comrades also stop the hunger strike of solidarity, the threat of sanctions will end.
There would not be the case of Mehman Huseynov and related problems for Azerbaijan if the government did not react so inadequately to the professional activities of a blogger who showed the public what everyone knows: rampant corruption reigns in the country. M. Huseynov fought against corruption. Instead of helping Mehman to expand his exposure to the state, opponents sanctioned persecution of the video blogger. We see the result today: new accusations have been added to the numerous accusations from the international community, now about the illegality of the conclusion and the new persecution of the journalist.
Mehman Huseynov became popular in Azerbaijan for his video blogs, in which he exposed the corruption cases of high-ranking government officials, filming their villas and displaying videos on a social network. However, his first conviction was in 2017, allegedly for defaming a police officer. Since March 2017, Huseynov is serving a term imposed by the court, which will end in March 2019. But on December 26, 2018, new charges were brought against him of "resisting a representative of the authorities with the use of violence dangerous to his health and life," for which he could be sentenced to seven years in prison. The charges were filed two months before the end of his imprisonment and after he publicly accused the authorities of his mother"s death in hospital in August 2018.
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