Monitoring Group urges Council of Europe to seek release of opposition leaders

The Monitoring Group of Human Rights Organizations has addressed a letter to Council of Europe Secretary General Terry Davis in connection with the conviction of seven opposition leaders. "When entering the Council of Europe, the Azerbaijan authorities undertook some obligations, including the discharge of all political prisoners. Unfortunately, the Azerbaijan authorities have not met these obligations and continue to enlarge the list of political prisoners by new names. The trial against the opposition leaders, which came to an end, showed one more time the inability of the Azerbaijan judicial system, in which judges fully depend on the authorities' will. In view of it the Monitoring Group of Human Rights Organizations considers the sentence passed on the seven opposition leaders chartered, and the leaders themselves political prisoners. The Monitoring Group asks the Council of Europe to recognize all people convicted in the aftermath of the October 2003 developments as political prisoners and seek their release," reads the address.

US State Department Deputy Spokesman Adam Ereli has also roundly denounced the court decision concerning the seven opposition leaders. During his regular briefing in Washington, he said: "The US administration closely watched the course of trials against October 2003 demonstrators. We're disappointed with how these trials were held. They didn't correspond with Azerbaijan's commitments to ensure citizens' right to a fair and independent trial. These trials, including the last one against the seven leaders, didn't correspond with international norms as well." Official Washington "strongly called upon Azerbaijan to take necessary measures to provide the supremacy of law in the country," he added.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New-York-based international press freedom organization, has also condemned the Azerbaijan authorities for imprisoning for five years Rauf Arifoglu, editor-in-chief of the Yeni Musavat newspaper. The organization's statement on the matter reads that after the 2003 presidential election, attacks on the opposition press have intensified in Azerbaijan. "The Rauf Arifoglu case is another example of the authorities' attacks against the media in Azerbaijan," CPJ director Ann Cooper stated. "We urge President Ilkham Aliyev to do everything necessary to cancel Arifoglu's accusations and conduct an independent and fair investigation of accusations and evidence in his case," she said.