Baku: police stops commemoration in front of ASOA

Today in Baku, the police did not allow activists of youth branches of political parties and youth organizations of Azerbaijan to hold a commemoration of the victims of the massacre committed in the Azerbaijan State Oil Academy (ASOA) three years ago.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on April 30, 2009, a native of Georgia Farda Gadirov entered the ASOA building and opened fire from his pistol, killing 12 and wounding 13 more persons; then, he shot himself.

Today, several groups of young activists numbering about 150 persons tried to march from different directions to the ASOA, where three years ago a bloody drama was staged. However, in the morning reinforced police units have blocked both accesses to the building in Dilara Alieva Street.

Despite the fact that the protesters did not shout out any slogans, and just carried banners with photos of killed students, the police blocked their way and began squeezing young people into surrounding streets.

In this collision, Jamil Gadjiev, the head of the youth organization of the Democratic Party of Azerbaijan (DPA), was severely beaten. He was put into a police car and driven away to some unknown place.

"The police showed disrespect not only to the participants of commemoration. It is disrespect to the memory of the victims of terror. We just wanted to commemorate our murdered peers and protest against terror," said Samir Asadli, the head of the youth organization of the "Civil Solidarity" Party.

The Chief Police Department of Baku has explained that the commemoration action was stopped because it was not sanctioned by the Baku Mayoralty.

The ASOA told, in its turn, that on the third anniversary of the tragedy they held an "internal mourning ceremony."

Let us remind you that on the case of mass murder at the ASOA, four natives of Georgia - relatives and fellow villagers of Gadirov - were brought to trial. The court found them guilty on a number of articles, including "terrorism" and "murder". However, according to Sulkhaddin Akper, an independent expert in the field of security and a former deputy minister of national security, and now the chairman of the "Atlantic Cooperation Association of Azerbaijan", the customers of the crime were never found, and its real motives were never established.

According to Mr Akper, the terror act at the ASOA was organized by intelligence services of the countries, which oppose the strengthening of Azerbaijan's energy cooperation with the West. He believes that the ASOA as the target was not occasional, that is, it was a sort of hint to the target of the attack. "The terror act followed immediately after the head of Azerbaijan made a visit to Brussels, where he discussed the 'Nabucco' Project with the leadership of the EU project," he said.