The European Court sent questions to the government of Azerbaijan
Complaints of lawyers, human rights defenders, journalists and activists are being investigated
The European Court of Human Rights addressed questions to the government regarding several complaints sent from Azerbaijan.
In the case of lawyers Elchin Sadigov and Zibeyda Sadigovana, the applicants disputed the violation of the right to respect for private life.
The court case is related to allegations of illegality of the search and seizure of the applicants’ office, home and car as part of a criminal case opened at the end of 2022.
Within the framework of the said criminal case, at the same time, the office and house of the editor-in-chief of “Khural” newspaper, Avaz Zeynalli, were searched and seized. Following the resignation of human rights defender Rufat Safarov from his position as an investigator of the Zardab District Prosecutor’s Office, the complaint filed against him in the criminal case is also among the investigated cases. At that time, Safarov was accused of bribery and sentenced to 9 years in prison.
2 complaints of Anar Mammadov, editor-in-chief of “Criminal.az” website, have been investigated. These complaints are related to the criminal case filed against the site and the editor-in-chief due to the articles published on the site during the assassination of the head of the Ganja City Executive Authority in 2018. At the time of the events, A. Mammadov’s house was searched without a warrant, mobile phones, computers and some documents were taken. After that, the editor-in-chief was sentenced to conditional freedom for 5 years and 6 months.
The “Elvin Guliyev v. Azerbaijan” case, which has started to be communicated, is related to the illegality of the administrative error proceedings against the applicant. The applicant, who is a political activist and shares critical statuses on social media, was taken to the police, accused of disobeying the legal request of the police and arrested for 30 days.