In Azerbaijan, oppositionist Bashirli again denied his CER

Today, the Baku Court of Appeal (BCA) has rejected the appeal complaint lodged by Ruslan Bashirli, the head of the youth organization "Eni Fikir" (New Thinking), against refusal to apply the conditional early relief (CER) to him.

Mr Bashirli was arrested in August 2005 on charges of an attempted putsch and sentenced to seven years in prison. Under the law, a convict under this article may be released after serving more than three quarters of the sentence, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was told by Takhir Khanaliev, the advocate of the oppositionist. However, according to the lawyer, on August 22, the Nizami District Court wrongfully refused, at its visiting session, held at the penitentiary establishment No. 1, to apply the CER to Bashirli.

"Unfortunately, the BCA upheld this unfair decision," said the lawyer and noted that Bashirli would lodged a cassation complaint against this decision, and - if rejected again - would apply to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

Mr Khanaliev maintains that Azerbaijani courts biased in relation to his client. According to his story, the refusal to apply the CER to Bashirli was based on the negative characterization of him by the bosses of the penitentiary institution. In particular, they pointed out that in the colony Bashirli "led a secluded life, communicated with nobody, and did not repent of his crime." This was the basis for the bosses to conclude that Bashirli "had not corrected."

However, according to the lawyer, such opinion is "completely subjective." "A man decides by himself whether to communicate with someone or not. The main thing is that he did not violate the internal rules of the colony," said Khanaliev.

He saw another indication of the biased attitude of the courts to Bashirli in non-transparency of the case. "The Nizami Court held its session in the colony, while the BCA considered the complaint without participation of the applicant and the media," Khanaliev has added.

Only 9 months are left until the end of Bashirli's term; and by refusing to release him, the authorities demonstrate their intolerance to political opponents, said the lawyer.

The BCA refused from comments, citing that "the judge makes decisions based on relevant provisions of the law." The source from the court has added that "the dissatisfied parties are free to challenge the court decision at the Supreme Court."