2024-07-05 09:49:28
On May 15, the Baku Court of Appeals upheld the appeals filed against the Khatai District Court’s decision that the detention of Abzas Media website director Ülvi Hasanli, Sevinj Vagifgızı, the website’s editor-in-chief, as well as Imran Aliyev, the head of Meclis.info website, should not be replaced by house arrest. has not been done.
According to the information provided by the lawyers to the Voice of America, the decisions of the first instance court were upheld in separate trials.
The lawyers note that the mentioned persons stated in the court proceedings that there was no reason for their imprisonment and that their arrest was related to their journalistic activities.
It should be recalled that on May 9, the Khatai District Court did not grant the petitions of Abzas Media website director Ulvi Hasanli, website editor-in-chief Sevinj Vagifqizi, as well as Meclis.info website head Imran Aliyev’s petitions to replace the preventive measure with house arrest.
Reminder
Ulvi Hasanli, the site’s director, was detained on November 20 of last year in the criminal case related to “Abzas Media”. That day, his house and the office of “Abzas Media” were searched, and 40,000 euros were allegedly found in the office.
Later, on November 20, deputy director Mahammad Kekalov was detained at the airport when he returned from abroad on November 21, Sevinj Vagifqizi, the editor-in-chief of the site.
Journalists Nargiz Absalamova, Elnara Gasimova and investigative journalist Hafiz Babaly were also arrested in that case. All of the journalists were charged with Article 206.3.2 of the Criminal Code (smuggling by a group of people in advance). The sanction of this article provides imprisonment from 5 to 8 years.
None of them plead guilty, stating that their arrests were related to their professional activities.
On April 18, the head of “Meclis.info” website Imran Aliyev was detained at the Heydar Aliyev International Airport. According to Article 206.3.3 of the Criminal Code (smuggling-when committed by an official using his position of service), a preventive measure of detention for 2 months and 1 day was chosen against him. On April 26, a new charge was brought against Imran Aliyev under Article 206.3.1 of the Criminal Code (smuggling – if repeated).
International media protection organizations called on the Azerbaijani authorities to immediately release the arrested journalists and stop the pressure on the independent media. The government of Azerbaijan declares that people in the country are not persecuted for their political views and that all fundamental rights are fully guaranteed.
Voice of America