In Azerbaijan, court forbids authorities to interfere with import of Jehovah's Witnesses' literature into the country

The Azerbaijani State Committee for Working with Religious Structures is ignoring the court decision, which has obliged the Committee to lift restrictions on importation of religious literature of Jehovah's Witnesses to the country, believers assert.

The religious community had appealed to the above Committee asking to bring to Azerbaijan 1500 copies of religious literature and the issue of the magazine "Watchtower" of December 15, 2010. In response the Committee gave permission for delivery of only 300 copies of the literature, and prohibited the magazine whatsoever, the APA reports.

The religious community of Jehovah's Witnesses then filed a claim asking to ensure delivery to Azerbaijan of the religious literature and the magazine and to collect compensation from the Committee in the amount of 1000 manats for material damage and 800 manats for moral harm.

On September 9, 2011, Judge Takhira Asadova from the Baku Administrative-Economic Court No. 1 obliged the State Committee for Working with Religious Organizations to allow importation of Jehovah's Witnesses' publications in "the necessary volume," reports the Official Media Web Site of Jehovah's Witnesses. The court found no signs of violence propaganda and calls for religious hatred or enmity in the publications in question.

In the opinion of the judge, the comments contained in the publication on the teachings of other religions are manifestations of religious belief, as enshrined in the Constitution of Azerbaijan and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). In her decision, Judge Asadova refers to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), in particular, to the case "Kokkinakis vs. Greece", according to which the religious freedom assumes not only the right to choose one's religion, but also to manifest it.

Despite the decision of the court, by early October, the above State Committee of Azerbaijan banned importation of more than 30 publications of Jehovah's Witnesses, as alleged by the above believers' information resource. Besides, it is reported that even if a religious community is allowed to import its literature, the Committee imposes restrictions on the number of imported copies of each publication. Thus, over the past two months, the Committee has allowed Jehovah's Witnesses to import only 30-80 percent of their claimed volumes of literature.

The position of the Azerbaijani State Committee for Working with Religious Organizations concerning this case is not yet known.