Azerbaijan: challenge of the court petitioned by bloggers' advocates rejected

Today, the Baku Appeal Court, chaired by Gail Mamedov, continued considering the complaint lodged by bloggers Emin Milli and Adnan Gadjizade.

The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports that Judge Mamedov has announced that the petition of bloggers' advocates to challenge the staff of the court, put forward at the previous session on February 17, was rejected by the top managers of the Baku Appeal Court. Thus, the case will be considered by the former staff of the court, said Mr Mamedov.

Isakhan Aushrov, Gadjizade's advocate, demanded explanations about the reasons why the victims - Vyusal Mamedov and Babek Guseinov - had again failed to appear at the trial, despite numerous petitions of the defence.

Elton Guliev, Milli's advocate, asked time from the court "to speak out and present material evidences of bloggers' innocence." He has reminded that during consideration of the case by the first instance court, many witnesses presented by the defence were not interrogated, and photo and other materials were not taken to consideration.

Mr Milli has also supported his lawyer by adding that the Sabail District Court had failed with "fair investigation", and, consequently "there's need of repeated investigation by the appeal instance."

The Judge, having noted that "there's no sense to protract the litigation," nevertheless reappointed the next session on 3:00 p.m. on March 10.