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A wave of protests against the rise of prices in Azerbaijan has reached the city of Guba taking about 5 thousand people out into the streets. They gathered in the district of the bus station since 15 January in the morning to express their discontent with the unemployment and rise of prices, local Turan news agency reports.

According to the sources of the agency, the main part of the protesters come from the villages where the socio-economic situation is particularly grave. They complain of the exorbitant credits, unemployment and the officials’ arbitrariness. One of the protesters told the Baku bureau of RFE/RL that he could not go home, where five hungry children are waiting for him.  

After the protesters refused to disperse, internal troops entered the city and surrounded the protesters. The police control the entry and exit of the city and check the whole transport.

Turan reports that the population perceived the information about a bomb being set in a local mosque and the call to the believers not to gather as a ‘trick to restrain the people from crowding.’ As a result, the demonstration had been dispersed by the evening with the help of water cannons, tear gas and batons, which was followed by arrests. The number of those detained remains unknown, the agency reports citing RFE/RL.

The Azerbaijani website Haqqin.az cites Azadlig newspaper reporting that Shahin Alizadeh, an activist of the district organisation of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), was detained in the Azerbaijani city of Shivan.  The district court sentenced the activist to 30 days arrest.

As for the arrest of a representative of the head of the executive authorities in Fizuli District, Shakir Hajiyev, the spokesperson for the Prosecutor General’s Office, Eldar Sultanov, said that ‘a Makarov pistol and shells for it have been found during the searches of his flat.’ Arrested on charges of organising mass disorders, Hajiyev was sued as a suspect in a criminal case initiated in the Prosecutor General’s Office of Baku, Haqqin.az reports.

Musavat, a local opposition party, condemned the authorities over the persecution of the participants of the spontaneous protests in the regions and the pressure on the activists of the party. Solidary with the demonstrators and fully supporting their demands, the party opined that the protests take place spontaneously because the Azerbaijani authorities ‘do not take up effective measures to prevent the price rises,’ Turan writes.

“The detentions and violence against the participants of the protests, as well as the criminal cases filed against them, pursue the aim of intimidation,” the party said in a statement as cited by Turan.

The agency writes that the ‘warning’ made to Arif Hajily, Musavat Party leader, at the Main Directorate for Combating Organised Crime, as well as the arrests of the heads of Lenkoran and Siyazan departments of Musavat ‘all come as a demonstration of the authorities’ pressure.’

The party also said that the heads of its regional departments are summoned by the law enforcement agencies, where they are accuses of appeals to hold protests.

“We declare that the current protests have not been organised either by Musavat or other opposition party. Those campaigns are the demonstration of the population’s protest against the intolerable social situation,” the party said demanding to cease the violence and the cruel treatment of the demonstrators, put an end to the opposition members’ summoning to the law enforcement agencies and release the detained participants of the campaigns.

Stratfor, geopolitical intelligence firm, writes  that President Ilham Aliyev ‘has a firm grip on power, but Azerbaijan will not be immune to instability if declining oil prices and the economic pain they bring continue.’

According to the firm, the country has a less effective opposition than other countries in the region, such as Georgia and Armenia. If the protests grow and spread to other cities in Azerbaijan, it could lead to a level of social and political pressure that Azerbaijan has not experienced in decades.

Meanwhile, Adil Mammadov, Azerbaijani journalist and former reporter of Lider TV, left Azerbaijan and asked for asylum in Germany, Qafqaz.info reported, according to Haqqin.az. “The reasons of my emigration were my political views and the conflicts of interest of some circles after my reportages. I was subjected to persecutions in Azerbaijan. I don’t know how long I will stay in Germany, but I will certainly not go back to Azerbaijan until a democratic society is formed there,” Mammadov said.

Another well-known Azerbaijani TV journalist, Ilham Serkhanli, who is married with a former staffer of the dissolved Security Ministry of Azerbaijan, left the country in December 2015. He also moved to Germany with the intention to apply for an asylum.

Remarkably, many dissidents preferred to leave Azerbaijan as political emigrants and settle abroad, mainly in Europe and the US, following a wave of arrests of civil society leaders. Natig Adilov, a journalist residing in France as a political emigrant, said the government of Azerbaijan implements a range of methods to exert surveillance of its emigrated citizens. He said the people who left Azerbaijan because of political persecution or unemployment are under constant surveillance by the government. This constant scrutiny of citizens in exile, political refugees in particular, used to be carried out by diaspora organisations.

On 12 January 2015, the residents of Lenkoran, Fizuli, Siyazan, Agjebed and Agsu districts of Azerbaijan held demonstrations in front of the buildings of the executive powers of their districts against the price hikes, unemployment, criminal and ban on selling alcohol drinks and tobacco products with cash. As a result of the punitive measures taken up by law enforcement agencies, the demonstrations were dispersed, and the chairman of the Lenkoran District department of PFPA, Nazim Hasanli, as well as the chairman of the Musavat party Lenkoran district organisation, Imamverdi Aliyev, were detained and sentenced to administrative arrest.