Azerbaijan: Einullah Fatullaev fears for his life

Einullah Fatullaev, founder and editor-in-chief of the newspaper "Real Azerbaijan", serving his imprisonment in Azerbaijan, has stated a threat to his life. This was the topic of his letter addressed to the bosses of the Penitentiary Services of Azerbaijan and to the Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders and Committee to Protect Journalists, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

The journalist's appeal, which arrived from Fatullaev's relatives, asserts that the operation "heroin", undertaken against him in the end of last December, was "an element of the plot to kill him." "I've learnt that the provocation with the heroin planted on me was the first stage of a big plan implemented under the order of the ruling circles of the country," Mr Fatullaev wrote.

According to his version, organizers of the provocation are using the technology applied earlier against the late Rena Nasibova, who fell victim of a criminal grouping exposed in 2005, headed by Gadji Mamedov, senior operative office of the Department of Criminal Investigation of the local MIA. Rena Nasibova was a witness of the crimes committed by the grouping and wanted to expose the culprits, but was assassinated in July 2004. The examination pictured her as a drug addict, although, actually, she was just strangled, as the journalist asserts.

"The first step has been made: I was accused of drug using, and the following doze can be fatal. It is remarkable that I'm thoroughly guarded at the Baku investigatory custody, which emphasizes the reality of such threat," the journalist concluded.

In his turn, the official spokesman of the Penitentiary Services of Azerbaijan stated the inconsistency of Fatullaev's statements about plans to kill him in custody.