07:49, 7 March 2019

Azerbaijani rights defender Gasanov links his detention with list of political prisoners

Elshan Gasanov, the head of the Political Prisoners' Monitoring Centre, was detained on Wednesday and released after a talk about his participation in the oppositional rally in January. Gasanov has treated it as pressure because of his human rights activities.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in August 2011, Gasanov was sentenced to two years in prison on charges of violating the public order. Later, the court reduced the term to one year. The Amnesty International (AI) announced Gasanov to be a "prisoner of conscience". In February 2012, he was released under the conditional early relief (CER).

According to Gasanov, law enforcers questioned him about the reasons for participating in the rally on January 19.

"I said that the rally was dedicated to the release of the blogger Mekhman Guseinov and other political prisoners, and I took part in the rally as a rights defender. I was told that 'people of my age (Gasanov is 59 years old, – note of the "Caucasian Knot") should not participate in rallies.' I replied that I'd continue coming to actions dedicated to political prisoners," Mr Gasanov has concluded.

"Most likely, this had to do with the updated list of political prisoners and the announcement of a report on the situation with torture in jails," he has added.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on March 6, 2019 at 11:58 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.

Author: Faik Medjid

Source: CK correspondent