ARTICLE 19, the global campaign for free expression, has voiced grave concern about the state of press freedom in Azerbaijan following recent arrests and attacks on journalists in the country. The latest cases include the arrest of Eynulla Fatullayev, founder and senior editor of Realny Azerbaijan and Gundelik Azerbaijan, and the violent attack on Deputy Editor Uzeir Jafarov of Gundelik Azerbaijan. Realny Azerbaijan was founded in May 2005 after Fatullayev´s previous newspaper, the Monitor, was shut down following the killing of its editor-in-chief, Elmar Huseynov, in March 2005.

Written by Natasha Schmidt, from a report by ARTICLE 19.

Fatullayev was recently prosecuted in connection with an article written in 2005 in Realny Azerbaijan in which he criticised the authorities and armed forces for failing to protect residents of the town of Khojaly during a siege by Armenian forces in February 1992, at the height of the Karabakh conflict. He was charged with defamation under article 147 of the criminal code and on 20 April 2007 was found guilty of offending refugees from Khojaly. He was sentenced to two and a half years in prison and was taken into  custody immediately following sentencing.

On the same day of the sentencing, his deputy, Uzeir Jafarov, was brutally attacked and taken to hospital with serious injuries. The attack came hours after Jafarov testified in a Baku court as a witness in defense of Fatullayev’s case. 

Fatullayev is the fifth journalist currently in prison in Azerbaijan, giving the country one of the worst records in the region for the treatment of journalists.

In a letter to Azerbaijan´s President Ilham Aliyev, Executive Director of ARTICLE 19,  Agnes Callamard wrote; “Such treatment of journalists violates Azerbaijan´s international obligations to protect human rights and runs contrary to its political and legal commitments to the democratic process. This creates a climate of fear, which is incompatible with a free and independent media and ultimately undermines the credibility of Azerbaijan´s democracy.”

For Human Rights House report on Elmar Huseynov´s murder, click here