I am ashamed!

Dear Leyla Khanum, I congratulate you on your birthday and feel a sense of shame for you meet it in such dire circumstances. It is a shame for the country, for our intellectuals and for me that this became possible. With a heavy heart I watch the arbitrariness happening over your family and I am shocked by the callousness of those who dispenses justice we have. Who brought them to such a slavish obedience to the authorities?!

I knew your father, Teymur Muallim, one of the founders of the national film industry. Since then, it took fifty years, but I remember the appearance and behavior of a genuine intellectual who was a distinguished one in the cinematic medium then. I saw similar qualities in you at our not very frequent meetings. And I am convinced that you will be able to survive, no matter how rudely those, in whose hands you are, violate the laws of conscience and justice. And I believe in the fact that you will still celebrate many more birthdays with your family for the joy of people loving and respecting you in Azerbaijan and beyond.

I hope that my congratulation will come to you and will confirm that thousands and thousands of people are with you in their thoughts on this day.

With brotherly feelings,

Rustam Ibrahimbekov