Your trusted source

Today, during Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov’s speech at the PACE session in Strasbourg, a group of Azerbaijani political refugees staged a protest. According to the Azerbaijani news agency "Turan", the protesters in the lodge hall chanted "Freedom to political prisoners in Azerbaijan!".

After the head of the PACE, Anne Brasseur, asked the protesters to keep quiet, the action continued in the silent form: political emigrants dressed in red T-shirts with images of political prisoners raised their hands.

Brasseur herself, before giving the floor to Mammadyarov, wished to hear the explanation of the processes occurring in the country. At the same time, she noted that she meant the arrests of activists that are a concern.

Brasseur said that last week she was in Azerbaijan and met some of those arrested. She noted that there are serious problems in Azerbaijan with compliance with CE standards, in particular in the area of judicial independence, freedom of assembly, expression, and these problems must be solved quickly.

Chairmanship in the Committee of Ministers is not only a responsibility, but also a good opportunity to demonstrate commitment to its obligations to the Council of Europe. Baku still has time to take steps in these areas prior to the completion of Azerbaijan's chairmanship. However Mammadyarov in his speech went through all these questions, and talked about general topics, describing the activities of the Council of Europe during the presidency of Azerbaijan.

However Mammadyarov in his speech went through all these questions and spoke basically about general topics, describing the activities of the Council of Europe during the presidency of Azerbaijan.

Nevertheless, the problem of human rights rose PACE deputies. Thus, Robert Bedron, in particular, asked why tax organs audit only independent NGOs, but it does not apply to the Heydar Aliyev Foundation?.

Answering the question of Tiny Koch ,why after Ilham Aliyev promised to hold a round table on the topic of political prisoners, new arrests continued in Azerbaijan, while no dialogue was held, Mammadyarov said, "summer vacations", and stated that after the Qurban Bayram a work in this direction will start.

To the question of McNamara how the arrests of human rights defenders Leyla Yunus, Intigam Aliyev, Rasul Jafarov affect the image of the CoE member country, Mammadyarov said that he had already given the answer of this question to McNamara in Baku, and they have different views on this issue.

In conclusion, the Minister denied the existence of political prisoners in Azerbaijan.
According to the Institute for Peace and Democracy (IPD) of Azerbaijan as of 21 May 2014 there were 130 victims of political repressions in Azerbaijan: 41 of which are prisoners of conscience and 89 are political prisoners. Already in July 2014 IMD director Leyla Yunus and her husband Arif Yunus were arrested on charges of espionage