In Azerbaijan, the Committee Against Tortures visited disciplinary battalion

Elchin Bekhbudov, chairman of the Committee Against Tortures in Azerbaijan, jointly with Bairam Sadykhov, his deputy, conducted a monitoring of the disciplinary battalion located in the Salianskiy District and subordinated to the Chief Administration of Military Police. E. Bekhbudov himself told the Day.Az about it.

According to him, the disciplinary battalion ("disbat") keeps those soldiers, convicted for non-manual relations, self-willed quitting a military unit, desertion and other offences for punishment terms from three months to two years.

E. Bekhbudov asserts that so far no monitoring has been ever held in the disciplinary battalion either by the ombudsman's office, or by human rights activists of Azerbaijan.

"Colonel-Lieutenant Ekhtiyar Mamedov is the commander of the disciplinary battalion were 98 persons are in custody. I managed to meet him. Besides, I managed to talk in private with many soldiers who serve their sentences there. I asked about custody conditions, nutrition, relations with the officers and any tortures applied to the inmates. In the course of the talks with them, it became clear that there were no tortures in this battalion, and the relations with officers and ensigns are normal. As to custody conditions, there are quite normal: clean rooms, windows without bars, regular baths, two visits of parents per month are allowed, and two telephone calls home per month may be made. There are no problems with the meals that the inmates are given. On the day of my visit, they were given buckwheat porridge with stewed meat and drank stewed fruit (compot). Since our visit was an ad hoc one and known to nobody in advance, I think, there are no grounds to say that this attractive picture was created especially towards our visit," E. Bekhbudov concluded.

We note here that the World Organization Against Tortures (WOAT) is conducting in Baku, with the aim to trace the observance by the Azerbaijan Republic of the UN guidelines in the area of human rights and in cooperation with human rights organizations, three one-day workshops. The first of them was held yesterday, on April 26, and was attended by representatives of multiple local human rights organizations. Today and tomorrow similar workshops will be conducted among state servants.

Leila Yunus, Director of the Institute for Peace and Democracy, informed that invitations to the workshops held on Thursday and Friday were given to representatives of the Ministry of National Security (MNS) and MIA of Azerbaijan.

Besides, on Friday, April 28 at 1:00 p.m., the "Hyatt Hotel" will host a press conference, where an estimate will be expressed on fulfilment by Azerbaijan of its international obligations in the area of human rights, in particular, on prohibition of tortures and on rights of women.