There are no changes in the registration of grants and donors, activists

Baku / 02.06.17 / Turan: Despite the government's declarations on simplifying the procedure for registering grants and foreign donors, there is no improvement in the situation for the activities of independent NGOs. This was the leitmotiv of today's meeting Forum of Civil Society "Eastern Partnership".

According to the coordinator of the National Platform Ziya Quliyev, the Working Group is one of the four sections of the platform devoted to human rights, democracy and the rule of law. The event was organized jointly with the Eurasia Partnership Foundation. Head of the Center for Public Initiatives Gubad Ibadoglu made a presentation on the situation of civil society and the prospects for an open government.

He divided the history of Azerbaijan's civil society into three periods: 1993-2003. - formation, 2003-2009. - development, after 2008 - displacement of independent institutions of civil society and crisis.

In 2013-2014 years in the legislation, reactionary amendments were adopted that significantly complicated the registration of grants and foreign donors.

In January 2017, presidential decrees were issued on the alleged simplification of procedures for registering grants and donors on the principle of a "single window". However, there was no real simplification. So, a foreign donor is obliged to register each time, issuing another grant. In addition, the order of approval by the Ministry of Finance of the "economic feasibility" of the project is preserved.

It is no coincidence that over the past five months, no project of independent NGOs has been registered with the Ministry of Justice.

Ibadoglu noted that in December 2016 a small grant from the US Embassy was presented for $ 760, and there is still no registration.

In addition, the powers of the Ministry of Justice have now been expanded to investigate NGO documents under the pretext of combating terrorism. In addition to legislative restrictions, there is no normal environment: activists are arrested, offices are closed, bank accounts are blocked, fines are imposed, taxes are arbitrarily assessed, conference rooms for events are not provided, activists are subjected to degrading checks when going abroad and back, and many are prohibited from going abroad.

"How we can talk about what kind of environment for NGOs, even if our today's event is not held in the framework of a grant, but a service contract," Ibadoglu said.

He drew attention to the fact that service contracts, unlike grants, are taxed for commercial structures.

Ibadoglu also said that the authorities ignore the principles of the "Open Government" international initiative. Instead, they created a semblance of the Open Government platform of only pro-government NGOs.

Member of the Civil Society Platform Alesker Mammadli confirmed that there can not be any real improvement in the working conditions of NGOs, because the legislation does not abolish the restrictive norms introduced in recent years.

He noted that the grants allocated by the Council for State Support of NGOs under the president are not support to civil society, but rather the payment of services for government PR.

Mamedli drew attention to the fact that even grants for supporting education are not registered. Thus, the authorities refused to register a grant of 1.5 million euros to the Khazar University. In addition, the persecution in the criminal case started against NGOs in 2014 was resumed. In particular, the day before, Aziz Orudzhev, the head of Internet TV channel "Channel 13" was arrested.

The head of the Institute of Democratic Initiatives Akif Gurbanov noted that international organizations seem to have resigned themselves to the situation when their principles are violated. A recent event with the participation of Western diplomatic missions revealed that no embassy could register their grants for NGOs.

Only representatives of the EU said that in the fall they will have a program of grants and they hope that there will be no problems. Gurbanov considers this optimism is in vain, since the government shows its lack of the desire to create conditions for an independent civil society because of its attitude towards NGOs, their perception of "enemies", "fifth column", "agents of foreign states". The conference also heard a report on the current state of political and civil rights of activist and lawyer Samad Rahimli.-06D-