Anar Mammadli | Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards

Posts Tagged ‘Anar Mammadli’

UN experts alarmed by arbitrary detention of Azerbaijani human rights defender Mammadli

May 28, 2025

26 May 2025

UN independent experts on 26 May 2025 expressed grave concern over the continued detention of Anar Mammadli, a prominent Azerbaijani human rights defender who was arbitrarily detained on 29 April last year. “Defending human rights should never be considered a crime,” the experts said.

Anar Mammadli, Chair of the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre (EMDS), was arrested on 29 April 2024 amid what experts describe as a growing clampdown on critical voices and independent election observers in Azerbaijan. His arrest came shortly after EMDS reported irregularities during the February 2024 presidential elections, and after he participated in events at the UN Human Rights Council.

On 28 June 2024, the experts wrote to the Azerbaijani authorities to raise serious concerns about Mammadli’s alleged arbitrary detention, warrantless searches, restricted access to legal counsel, deteriorating health conditions in detention and a smear campaign reportedly targeting him in retaliation for his legitimate human rights work.

“There are serious concerns that Mammadli’s detention and prosecution may be in retaliation for his human rights work and his engagement with UN mechanisms,” they said.

The Azerbaijani Government responded by denying the allegations, stating that Anar Mammadli was under investigation for smuggling and money laundering. According to their response, he has been provided with all necessary legal rights and medical care during his detention.

The experts are still concerned about the legal proceedings, especially given Mammadli’s previous imprisonment in 2013, which the European Court of Human Rights deemed unlawful and politically motivated. Despite the Court’s 2018 judgment requiring Azerbaijan to quash the conviction and restore Mammadli’s civil and political rights, these remedies have allegedly not been implemented.

The experts will continue to monitor the case, particularly with regard to any potential connection to reprisals for engagement with UN human rights mechanisms.

*The experts: Mary Lawlor, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders; Gina Romero, Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association; Irene Khan, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression; Tlaleng Mofokeng, Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.

https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/05/azerbaijan-un-experts-alarmed-year-long-arbitrary-detention-azerbaijani

Posted in human rights, Human Rights Council, Human Rights Defenders | 1 Comment »
Tags: Anar Mammadli, arbitrary arrest, Azerbaijan, election monitoring, Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre (EMDS, Special Rapporteur, UN Special Rapporteurs

In Azerbaijan, many releases but not Intigam Aliyev and Ismayilova

March 18, 2016

This blog has had many occasions to be negative about Azerbaijan [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/azerbaijan/], but this time some good news: President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan signed a decree yesterday (17 March 2016) for the Novruz holiday, pardoning 148 prisoners, among them thirteen journalists, human rights defenders and activists.

Human rights defender Rasul Jafarov at the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly in Baku in June 2014. ©2014 Aziz Karimov

The list includes: human rights campaigner Rasul Jafarov; the head of a local election monitoring group Anar Mammadli; youth activists from NIDA movement Rashad Hasanov, Rashadat Akhundov, Mammad Azizov, and Omar Mammadov; human rights defenders Taleh Khasmamedov and Hilal Mammadov; opposition Musavat party deputy chair Tofig Yagublu; journalists Parviz Hashimli and Yadigar Mammadli; also a blogger Siraj Karimov. Also today, the Baku Appeals Court converted a six-year prison sentence imposed on journalist Rauf Mirgadirov to a five-year suspended term, and released him from the courtroom.

While this is a great moment for those released, among those still behind bars on bogus charges are: political analyst Ilgar Mammadov, in defiance of the European Court of Human Rights decision on his case and the repeated calls by the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers to free him; human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev; and Azerbaijan’s prominent investigative journalist, Khadija Ismayilova. Also youth activist Ilkin Rustamzadeh and journalist Seymur Hazi.

“We are overjoyed for the journalists, human rights defenders, and activists who were released today after being imprisoned for exercising their basic rights of free speech and free assembly,” said Nenad Pejic, Radio Free Europe editor in chief. “But Khadija should have been among them”. [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2015/12/18/azerbaijan-khadija-ismayilova-remains-in-jail-but-council-of-europe-takes-exceptional-step/] In recent correspondence with RFE/RL, international human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, who will represent Ismayilova before the European Court of Human Rights, said that “the case involved a politically motivated prosecution to restrict [Ismayilova’s] freedom of speech… This is about a government that is abusing its power to silence journalists like Khadija, as well as other critics of the ruling regime.”

https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/03/17/dispatches-good-news-azerbaijan-change

In Azerbaijan, No Pardon For Ismayilova

Posted in HRW, human rights, Human Rights Defenders | 3 Comments »
Tags: Amal Clooney, Anar Mammadli, Azerbaijian, Hilal Mammadov, HRW, Human Rights Defenders, Ilgar Mammadov, Intigam Aliyev, Khadija Ismayilova, pardon, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Rasul Jafarov, release, Taleh Khasmamedov

Azerbaijan continues to ‘play the game’

April 28, 2015

Azerbaijan plays the game: Under pressure from a variety of sources to reduce its widespread repression of human rights defenders in the run up to the European Games [see my latest post: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2015/04/21/azerbaijan-a-formula-for-combining-sports-and-repression/], the authorities seems to have decided to give in a tiny bit (see two examples below) and continue for the rest with heavy-handed sentencing of human rights defenders:

– On 18 March 2015, Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev pardoned 101 prisoners, including Bashir Suleymanli, co-founder of the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre (EMDSC). Whilst welcoming Suleymanli’s release, on 19 March, the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (FIDH-OMCT) remains deeply concerned by the ongoing arbitrary detention of other prominent human rights defenders in Azerbaijan, including Anar Mammadli, chairman of the EMDSC, arrested on the same day, who remains currently detained. The EMDSC – which Azeri authorities have always refused to register – has been leading electoral monitoring activities in Azerbaijan since 2008.

– On 24 April 2015, the head of the United Nation’s Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT), Aisha Shujune Muhammad, announced that her four-member delegation had successfully conducted investigations of Azerbaijani prisons, police stations and investigative isolation units. “The Azerbaijani Government this time enabled unhindered access to places of deprivation of liberty,” said a statement published by the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. While welcoming the government’s cooperation, Muhammad added, “[The] State party has yet to guarantee all fundamental legal and procedural safeguards to persons deprived of their liberty, including access to a lawyer, a medical doctor, and to contact his or her family.” [As a state party to the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture, Azerbaijan is obliged to allow independent experts full access to sites of detention, but last September the SPT was forced to suspend its visit after being prevented from inspecting some sites and barred from completing its work at others, “in violation of Azerbaijan’s treaty obligations”]

But then – if you think it finally goes in the right direction – on the 22 April a Court in Baku sentenced human rights defender Mr Intigam Aliyev to seven and a half years imprisonment on trumped-up charges. For more on Intigam Aliyev see: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/intigam-aliyev/]. Many NGOs and governments condemned the sentencing including the EU (“The sentence of seven and a half years imprisonment and a further three-year ban on holding public office handed down to prominent human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev by an Azerbaijani Court is a further demonstration of the increasingly difficult situation faced by human rights defenders in Azerbaijan. This harsh sentence is disproportionate to the alleged offences, while serious shortcomings witnessed by international monitors during the trial raise fundamental questions as to the legality of these procedures.“)

Several important NGOs, including Amnesty International,Human Rights Watch, the Observatory on Human Rights Defenders (FIDH/OMCT) and Front Line Defenders, have pointed out that serious rights allegations have been escalating since 2012 as Azerbaijan is gearing up to host the first-ever European Games under the auspices of the Olympic Movement. [Over 6,000 athletes representing 50 countries from 12-28 June 2015; according to the London-based Business News Europe, the games are budgeted at an estimated eight billion dollars, and billed as the “most spectacular show in Azerbaijan’s history.”]

While the government of President Ilham Aliyev hopes to use the games to spotlight his country’s economic development, rights groups are pushing the European Olympic Committees and key National Olympic Committees to instead shift the focus onto human rights abuses and political prisoners. The Sports and Rights Alliance, urged the IOC to use its leverage with Azerbaijan to, among other things, demand the immediate and unconditional release of rights activists like Khajida Ismayilova, Leyla Yunus, Arif Yunus, Intigam Aliyev, Rasul Jafarov, Rauf Mirgadirov, Anar Mammadli, Ilgar Mammadov, and Tofig Yagulblu.

“Those participating in the European games being funded by the Azerbaijani government have a real obligation to speak out,” Buchanan of Human Rights Watch stressed.

Azerbaijan activist released after almost 10 months’ arbitrary detention – ALIRAN.

http://www.ipsnews.net/2015/04/u-n-committee-gets-unhindered-access-to-azerbaijans-detention-centres-but-is-it-enough/

https://iwpr.net/global-voices/azerbaijan-convictions-dont-convince

http://www.channel4.com/news/baku-european-games-azerbaijan-aliyev-human-rights-team-gb

Posted in AI, FIDH, Front Line, HRW, human rights, Human Rights Defenders, Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, OMCT | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Anar Mammadli, Azerbaijan, Bashir Suleymanli, EU, European Games, HRW, Human Rights Defenders, Intigam Aliyev, IOC, Khajida Ismayilova, Leyla Yunus, Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, Rasul Jafarov, Rauf Mirgadirov, Sports and Rights Alliance, Tofig Yagulblu, United Nation’s Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT)

Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards