Baku Defies European Judgement on Jailed Journalist

The Azerbaijani authorities appear determined to resist a European court ruling that they must release a journalist who judges said had been imprisoned unlawfully.

Eynulla Fatullayev, in jail for articles he wrote, now faces a further trial in an Azerbaijani court for alleged possession of drugs. He says the drugs were planted in his prison cell.

In a ruling announced in April, the European Court of Human Rights, ECHR, said the eight-and-a-half year prison term which a national court imposed on Eynulla Fatullayev amounted to excessive and unjustified punishment.

Despite the unequivocal ruling by the ECHR, which also awarded Fatullayev 25,000 euros plus costs, Baku has failed to release him and is planning to appeal the decision.

Chingiz Askerov, representing Azerbaijan at the European court, said the ruling was “inadmissible” under the European Convention on Human Rights and his own country’s laws.

“The European Court cannot substitute itself for the judicial, administrative or other organs of the state-respondent,” he said. “We will appeal for the case to be sent to the [ECHR] Grand Chamber so as to defend the interests of Azerbaijan.”

Fatullayev has been branded a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, and is regarded by rights activists as Azerbaijan’s most prominent political prisoner.

His two convictions stem from his time as editor of the Russian-language weekly Realny Azerbaijan and the Azeri-language daily Gundelik Azerbaycan. In 2005, he published an article questioning the official Azerbaijani position that Armenian forces massacred 700 Azeris in Khojali during the Karabakh war. This resulted in his prosecution and conviction on a defamation charge in 2007.

A second article, published in 2007 concerned President Ilham Aliyev’s relations with Washington, and led to a conviction for threatening terrorism.

In its ruling on the first conviction, relating to the article on Khojali, the ECHR said it saw no justification for a prison sentence, as this would be permissible only when a journalist engaged in hate speech or incitement to violence, neither of which applied here.

As for the second offence, the court said the conviction and the severity of the sentence constituted “a grossly disproportionate restriction of his freedom of expression”.

Dunja Mijatovic, representative on freedom of the media at the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, urged Baku to comply with the court’s decision.

“My office has always demanded that this case was examined from the point of view of press freedom and in the framework of the law. Now, after the decision by the European Court of Human Rights, there is only one route open – his immediate release,” she told Azadliq, the Azeri radio service of RFE/RL.

Fatullayev was previously deputy editor in chief of Monitor magazine, which was closed in 2005 after the murder of its editor-in-chief Elmar Huseynov. His killers have never been found.

Fatullayev was well known for his tough criticism of the government, and for simultaneously remaining independent of the political opposition. All independent observers saw his arrest in 2005 as punishment for his critical view of the authorities.

Fatullayev himself said the entire criminal process against him, which also included a fine of 235,000 US dollars for tax evasion, was a farce, and said the courts in Azerbaijan were “worse than those of the Nazis”.

According to his lawyer Isakhan Ashurov, the compensation awarded by the ECHR must be paid within six months. Ashurov was not able to predict when his client would be released.

Fatullayev now faces yet another trial, and says his life is at risk. Prosecutors say a fifth of a gram of heroin was found in his cell on December 29, and charged him with possession of drugs, despite his insistence that the heroin was planted.

“Even if another unfair decision is taken against Eynulla, then he must be freed nevertheless,” Ashurov said after a court hearing on the case on June 16. “The maximum sentence for this charge, possession of drugs, is three years, and my client has already served more than that.”

Samira Ahmedbeyli is an IWPR-trained reporter in Baku, and Shahin Rzayev is IWPR’s Azerbaijan country director.