TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN JULY 2020

3 July

All rights of the convicted Yunis Safarov are obliterated

Yunis Safarov

On 3 July 2018, Yunis Safarov shot at the then Ganja Mayor, Elmar Valiyev. Yunis Safarov was immediately captured and arrested on the spot, and since then he has been held in the pre-trial detention centre No. 1 in the village of Kyurdakhani.

His family members have been unable to communicate with him on the phone even two years later.

His lawyer, Bakhtiyar Hajiyev, told the media that he had a meeting with Yunis Safarov on 1 July,

“Yunis has psychological problems. He is very tense, and sometimes he cannot control his own actions. After all, he has not been allowed to contact his family on the phone for the period of two years by now”

Mr. Hajiyev, a lawyer, also pointed out that the Article 19.1 of Azerbaijan’s Law “On ensuring the rights and freedoms of detainees in custody” provides that a person arrested upon the issuance of a custodial sentence “may meet and hold confidential communications with his lawyer and legal representative in private, without limiting the number and duration of the meetings”.

However, according to Hajiyev, all his client’s rights are being totally violated,

“I submitted a request to the Court to meet and establish telephone contact with Yunis Safarov’s family members. However, the Court denied my request due to the absence of a procedural ruling issued by the authorities conducting the criminal prosecution. Yet, in response to our petition, the Penitentiary Service stated that there were no applied restrictions in relation to Yunis Safarov, including the meetings with his family members. It means that Yunis Safarov’s rights were restricted on the basis of a verbal instruction. Moreover, during the investigation, it is sometimes prohibited to have meetings between the detainee and his family members. But Yunis Safarov’s case has already been brought to the court and, therefore, no one can forbid him to meet with his family members. This is a measure against the Law. An open trial has already started.”

The lawyer has also appealed to the Ombudsman on several occasions but there has been no reaction to his appeals.

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN JUNE 2020

18 June

An inmate convicted for ” Nardaran case” demands amputation of his rotting leg

Shamil Abdulaliyev

The believer Shamil Abdulaliyev was arrested along with theologian Tale Bagirzade and 16 other believers during a police operation in the village of Nardaran on 26 November 2015, and he was sentenced to 14.5 years imprisonment in January 2017.

Now, his relatives have announced that Sh. Abdulaliyev, a 35-year-old man, is facing a death penalty. The fact is that during his arrest the police fired randomly and three bullets hit Shamil. Two of those bullets have never been removed from his body, and now it has led to serious complications. Abdulaliyev wrote about all that in his petition submitted to the Nizami District Court. In his petition, Shamil Abdulaliyev made a request for his release from detention due to a serious illness that prevented him to serve his sentence. He also highlighted that during those 5 years, both, his father and he, as well as his lawyer had repeatedly submitted the letters to various state authorities requesting the treatment and extraction of the bullets from Shamil’s body. About three years ago, the doctors at the Azerbaijan Clinical Medical Centre performed a CT scan to pinpoint the precise bullets place in his body,

“According to the medical examination his right leg was excessively bent, and it was 10 centimetres shorter. The doctors said that it was an urge to undergo an operation in order to remove the bullets from his right leg. In the meantime, they suggested a physiotherapy prior to the surgery, The doctors warned that if the operation was delayed, the right leg would be amputated. Recently, the doctors who examined the leg, said that it was too late and therefore the leg had to be amputated.”

According to the Adil Abdullayev, in the Main Medical department at the Ministry of Justice, said that his son’s leg had been rotting away and therefore, it should be operated, but only when his turn comes. But, according to the Adil Abdullayev,

“Shamil declares that he cannot tolerate the pain any longer and, only an urgent surgery and amputation of the leg could save him, since the leg is rotting away and causes the danger of poisoning of his entire body.”

Following Shamil Abdulaliyev’s statement, the Court ordered an expert examination in his case. A special medical expert commission of the Main Medical Department at the Ministry of Justice issued its verdict. The physicians confirmed that there were two bullets in Shamil Abdulaliyev’s body but pointed out that they were not life-threatening,

“His illness does not correspond to the elements mentioned in the “List of severe diseases that prevent convicts from serving their sentences”. The illness symptoms qualify the inmate to continue serving his sentence. He can be treated in the institution where he is serving his sentence.”

On 12 June 2020, the Baku City Nizami District Court heard the motion online. Sh. Abdulaliyev connected to the video trial and said that he did not expect any other response as a result of the Ministry of Justice doctors’ expertise,

“I knew that those who had ordered the arrest of an innocent person would not allow me to be freed”.

The Judge Rauf Ahmadov did not grant Shamil Abdulaliyev’s petition on the basis of the forensic report. His father Adil Abdulaliyev said that the ruling would be appealed,

“And if the local courts do not consider this case fairly, then we will file a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights. This is a murder of a man that takes place before our eyes, this is an act of torture”.

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN MAY 2020

3 May

The prisoner Elvin Nazarov was brutally beaten in Ganja

Elvin Nazarov

Shabnam Nazarova told the media that her husband Elvin Nazarov sentenced to 7 years imprisonment in the so-called “Ganja case” in March 2019 has been subjected to torture and other forms of repression while in custody,

“Elvin was transferred to the Shaki prison following his conviction and there, almost immediately, it was started a psychological war against him. From the very first day, Ramin Aliyev, the prison director, exerted a pressure on Elvin, and regularly subjected the convicted believer to physical beatings. The prison director is doing everything to put my spouse in the punishment cell. Yesterday, he forcibly shaved Elvin’s head. At the same time, Ramin Aliyev said that he was the LAW in the prison and would do whatever he wanted. Even though Elvin had been just shaven, he was undergone the torture of the shaving again.  Ramin Aliyev said “there is no such a law, I am in a mood to do it again”.

Elvin Nazarov’s wife explained that he was still suffering from severe headaches and heart pains as a result of the horrific torture inflicted on him during the investigation,

“When they tortured Elvin, they hit on his ears so hard that blood had been pouring out of his mouth and ears for several days. Even today, the physical and psychological pressure on a man in such a state does not cease. Elvin says that he filed complaints against the prison director anywhere he could but all in vain”.

 

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN APRIL 2020

21 April

A religious activist has complained about torture in the Azerbaijani police

Logo of the Muslim Unity Movement

The police tortured Hikmat Agayev, an activist of the “Muslim Unity” Movement who had been arrested under an administrative procedure, said Arzu Abdulla, a member of the Public Committee for the Protection of Rights of the Arrested Islamists.

According to Arzu Abdulla, Hikmat Agayev was detained when he was delivering food for the needy families on 10 April,

“Hikmat Agayev is a representative of a small business. He has a small grocery shop. At his own expense, he made food packages for the poor families and personally delivered food aid due to the quarantine regime. Because of social isolation, many were left unemployed and Hikmat Agayev decided to support these people. On 10 April, he was stopped on his way to a village on the outskirts of Baku by the traffic patrol while he was delivering the food. Agayev tried to explain to the officers where and why he was going to. However, the police officers were relentless. And then, right on the spot where he was stopped Hikmat Agayev started live streaming live on Facebook.”

H.Agayev’s video shows his car full of the grocery bags. He says that the police prevented him from delivering aid to the poor and issued a fine of 100 manats ($60).

Agayev also showed the ticket. The video was posted by Arzu Abdullah on her Facebook page on 10 April. And she further added that the next day, 11 April, Hikmat Agayev, while making another batch of aid, was grabbed from his shop and taken to one of the police stations.

1. Abdulla wrote,

“The next day Agayev was arrested and sentenced to 25 days detention by the court order, since he was found guilty of violating the quarantine regime and disobeying the police. For almost a week there was no communication with him. Finally, on Friday, April 17, he managed to send a note to his family. He wrote that he had been brutally beaten by the policemen and that they had broken his finger and damaged his ear. He also informed his family that he had written a letter to the Prosecutor’s Office with a complaint about the torture and a request to punish the perpetrators. As it turned out, the police had questioned Agayev about the reasons behind providing aid to the poor and about those who were funding it. He was beaten until he lost his consciousness”.

The human rights activist also specified that the police thereafter began threatening to target Agayev’s family members,

“Only then he provided the password to access his mobile phone, and the officers read his Facebook correspondence, deleted the video on which he had criticized the traffic cops”.

Javad Javadov, Hikmat Agayev’s lawyer, confirmed that he had managed to meet with his client only on 17 April. Just then the lawyer found out that H. Agayev had been arrested under the Articles 211 (Violation of quarantine) and 535.1 (Failure to obey the police) of the Administrative Offences Code of Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani human rights activists condemned the arrest and torture of Hikmat Agayev as ” Ilham Aliyev’s policy using the pandemic against his political opponents” and urged him to “stop his anti-constitutional actions”.

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN MARCH 2020

13 March

Arrested members of the “Muslim Unity” Movement are about to start a hunger strike

Logo of the Muslim Unity Movement

The imprisoned board members of the Movement “Muslim Unity” addressed to the public in an open letter, stating,

“Our main purpose in making this appeal is that we are still innocent and in custody. In fact, as everyone knows we have been convicted and imprisoned”.

It is further pointed out in the letter that a large number of prisoners, including believers, was pardoned in 2019 in accordance with a Presidential Decree. However, this pardon did not affect all of the imprisoned faithful movement members. And the imprisoned believers asked,

“If we are guilty why did they release our brothers who had been arrested along with us, and we are still kept imprisoned? When one runs out of the last hope, one also runs out of patience and does not really know what move to make in this case. So, we intend to start a hunger strike to make our innocent cry, our voice of truth be heard worldwide. We are forced to take such a step simply because we are losing hope that our voice cannot be heard otherwise. We call upon our relatives and friends to support us in this action.”

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN FEBRUARY 2020

22 February

Sheikh Sardar was barely out of jail when he once again faced the  police pressure

Sheikh Sardar Babayev

On 22 February, 2020, it came to the end the term of imprisonment of Sheikh Sardar Babayev (born on 12 March 1974), a member of the Spiritual Assembly of Azerbaijan (NSA) and editor-in-chief of www.maide.az, the theologian. He was sentenced by the District Court of the city of Masally in May 2017. After having received a religious education abroad, he was imprisoned for 3 years for leading the Muslim worship in a mosque (a restrictive measure was introduced in the Criminal Code in 2015, although Sheikh Sardar graduated from the Theological University in Iran in 2000, and therefore should not be arrested under this article, taking into account that the law is not retroactive).

At 5 a.m. he was released from the Correctional Colony No. 17, the place he had been incarcerated.

There were so many people (about 80) wishing to meet the renowned theologian that it was necessary to rent a ceremonial house in the Baku Yasamal district in order to accommodate all the worshippers. Yet, a few minutes later, when Sheikh Sardar arrived at the place the officers of the Yasamal district police department arrived at the ceremonial house and demanded all the believers to immediately leave the hall threatening them with arrests in case of refusal.

Unwilling to aggravate the situation, Sheikh Sardar and all the guests obeyed the police demands and left the ceremonial house. Thereafter, the renowned theologian returned to his house in Masally, while being warned not to conduct a worship service in any other mosque or face any imminent punishment if he ignored the warning.

 

TORTURE AND REPRESSIONS IN JANUARY 2020

27 January

The “Ganja case” believer is on the verge of death

Alim Yusifov

According to the website Vetenugrunda.az, Alim Yusifov, a prisoner in the so-called “Ganja case”, has serious health problems. His deteriorated health problems are the result of torture he underwent during the investigation. Yusifov, who is currently in pre-trial detention facility No. 17, repeatedly appealed to the management of the detention centre but he was not granted the right to be examined and treated.

Arzu Aliyeva, the prisoner’s mother, said to the Vetenugrunda.az journalist:

“Alim was brutally tortured in the course of the investigation. He was repeatedly beaten with a truncheon on his head and kidneys. All his internal organs are damaged. His health condition is not good at all. Even though he has been already asking the Penitentiary Service authorities to treat him for months, he is not transferred to any medical facility.

On 11 July 2018, Alim was dragged from his home to the Shamkir District Police Department, from there to the city of Ganja, where he was brutally tortured with demands to admit his involvement in drug trafficking or some other crime. He did not do it, so they broke his arm and nose. His lungs were very badly injured. For so many months he has not been able to get a treatment! And now, while his lungs has not healed yet, his kidneys are on the brink of failure too. All this is a result of severe torture during the investigation period.”

Alim Yusifov was born in Baku on 6 July 1989. Since his early childhood he had been raised only by his mother. When he got married Alim Yusifov moved to a rented house in the Shamkir district. He has two children, one is 8 and the other 9 years old. His wife has a cancer.

He was arrested as part of the Yunis Safarov case, who on 3 July 2018, carried out an assassination attempt on the Head of the Ganja Executive, Elmar Valiyev. The same day, on social media, there were circulated the photos capturing Yunis Safarov’s brutal torture, which immediately triggered numerous protests by the residents of Ganja. The authorities arrested many of them under the charges of terrorism, and in 2019-2021 70 people were sentenced to the lengthy prison terms. Alim Yusifov was one of them and sentenced to 7.5 years imprisonment on 10 May 2019.

 

31 January

Muslim Unity Movement declared pressure on its members

Logo of the Muslim Unity Movement

In recent days, six activists of the Muslim Unity Movement have been summoned to the Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The Movement does not disclose the names of these activists, but it is regarded as pressure on them.

“Law enforcement agencies impede our legitimate activities. We will inform international organizations and the diplomatic corps about this,” the document says.