IBA former head asks court for leniency

Djakhangir Gadjiev, a former board chairman of the International Bank of Azerbaijani (IBA), has referred in his appeal to the legislative amendments that had reduced prison terms under the articles imputed to him.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in October 2016, the court found Gadjiev guilty of stealing from the IBA of more than 211 million manats (about 138 million US dollars at the then exchange rate) and sentenced him to 15 years in prison.

On February 7, 2020, a session was held at the Garadag District Court of Baku, at which Gadjiev's motion asking to mitigate his punishment was considered.

Fakhraddin Mekhdiev, the advocate of the former banker, referred to the fact that in 2017, amendments were made in the country's Criminal Code to reduce the prison terms under a number of articles, including those, under which Gadjiev was sentenced.

According to his story, Gadjiev told the court that he had been prosecuted for four years without any proofs.

"Investigators attracted hundreds of witnesses, but none of them had testified against me. The expert opinion was also in my favour. I refuse to plead guilty. The president has signed a decree, and it recommended that the courts comply with the amendments made in the law. Since 2017, hundreds of people had their punishments mitigated. But for some reason, it's not applied to me. I expect a fair court's judgement," the advocate quoted Gadjiev as saying.

The court hearing was postponed until February 11.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on February 8, 2020 at 08:23 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.