‘Black January’ yearly homage ends with the arrest of opposition party members
Published: 25 January 2023 17:23
Most of those arrested are members of the Muslim Union Movement
On the 33rd anniversary of January 20, known as Black January in Azerbaijan, opposition party members held a joint visit to the Alley of Martyrs in Baku, where a yearly homage to the victims of the Soviet Army takes place. Some of them were detained during the event.
The number of people arrested after it reached eight people. Six of them are members of the Muslim Union Movement (MUM), and the other two are members of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA). Meydan TV was informed about the detentions by the mentioned organizations.
The PFPA informed that they knew about the detention of party member Anar Huseynov on January 20. Although the incident happened in front of many people and was even recorded on video, it was not possible to find out his location within a day. A day later, it became known that he was sentenced to 30 days of administrative imprisonment.
On January 24, Anar Huseynov’s lawyer learned about the arrest of another member of the party, Rovshan Safarov, and his 30-day administrative prison sentence when he met him in the detention center.
Until then, it was unknown under what conditions and why they were arrested.
Safarov was charged with articles 510 (petty hooliganism) and 535.1 (disobedience to the legal request of the police) of the Code of Administrative Offenses, and a 30-day administrative arrest was issued against him.
The Muslim Union Movement said that six members of the organization were arrested after visiting the Alley of Martyrs: Hasan Abbaszadeh, Nizami Ahmed, Imran Mammadli, Tarlan Seyidov, Rovshan Aliyev, and Telman Rashidov.
In response to Meydan TV’s inquiry about the arrests, the Press Service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs claimed that on January 20, a group of people violated the pre-arranged queue principle for visitors and tried to create confusion there. The attempt was prevented, and those who displayed noncompliance were detained.