Rights defenders doubt legality of CER rejection to Azeri oppositionist

Azerbaijani legislation has collisions regarding the conditional early relief (CER); and they are often used to refuse applying CER to political prisoners, rights defenders have claimed in their comments to the case of oppositional leader, Babek Gasanov.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Babek Gasanov, the head of the Narimanov District Branch of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), was sentenced to three years in prison for allegedly illegal financing of the PFPA. On July 1, 2020, the court refused to apply CER to him, explaining that he had earlier been placed into the dungeon (punishment cell) for a discipline violation. Activists treat it as politically-motivated discrimination.

Asabali Mustafaev, the head of the Sumgait Resource Centre for Democracy and Human Rights, has noted that, based on the Code on Sentence Execution, placing into the punishment cell during investigation, as in the case of Gasanov, cannot be treated as grounds for rejecting the CER. Only the disciplinary punishments imposed during serving the sentence should be accounted for.

According to the legislation, convicts for less grave crimes can ask for CER after serving a half or two-thirds of their terms, Namizad Safarov, the coordinator of the Committee against Repressions and Torture, has stated.

Djavid Gasanli, Babek's brother, believes that the activist is unreasonably persecuted; and this not only undermines his rights, but also worsens the financial situation of his family: Gasanov has three children.