SEPT. 1 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Baku sentenced investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova to 7-1/2 years in prison for various financial crimes, triggering heavy criticism from the West of Azerbaijan’s human rights record and commitment to free speech.

Ismayilova joins a growing list of human rights activists, journalists and opposition supporters who have been sent to prison by the authorities in Azerbaijan over the past few years.

Opponents of President Ilham Aliyev have accused him of effectively purging Azerbaijan of dissidents.

Kenneth Roth, executive director of the New York-based Human Rights Watch said: “The outrageous verdict against Khadija Ismayilova shows the Azerbaijani authorities’ willingness to subvert the law to exact revenge against critics.”

This opinion was backed up by other human rights and media agencies as well as the EU, the British government and the United States.

Azerbaijan retorts that the West is trying to organise a coup.

Ismayilova was jailed for tax evasion, embezzlement and abuse of power, almost an exact mirror of the type of wrong-doings she has investigated in various government agencies, and even the presidential family, over the past few years.

Mr Roth of Human Rights Watch said independent observers had been unable to access the courtroom because pro-government supporters had taken all the seating.

“The government gets away with things like this because Azerbaijan has paid no price for throwing one dissident, one human rights activists after another into prison,” he said.

Part of the dilemma for Europe is that it wants to reduce its gas dependency on Russia. This means finding an alternative source of gas and this source of gas is Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani government appears to have gambled that Europe won’t stop building pipelines and negotiating gas contracts despite grumbling about its crackdown on dissidents.

ENDS

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(News report from Issue No. 246, published on Sept. 4 2015)