Azerbaijani President pardons 59 persons

On March 18, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliev signed a Decree to pardon 59 prisoners. The convicted journalists and well-known political prisoners are not in the list.

The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports that according to the Decree a total of 51 prisoners will be released. Six more persons are freed from further serving their punishments related with restriction of freedom.

One prisoner will have his remaining term halved, and one more is released from corrective works. Contrary to assurances of many human rights activists and certain officials, and against expectations of international organizations, no convicted journalists and well-known political prisoners were put into the list, although the members of the pardon commission had stated shortly before signing the Decree that the names of convicted journalists were included into the list submitted to the President.

In the opinion of human rights activist Leila Yunus, although among those pardoned there are persons whose names are in the list of the Federation of Human Rights Organizations that had been presented to international organizations - they are five in number - however, as a whole, the Decree has failed to settle the problems of political prisoners in the country. Journalists Ganimat Zakhid, Mirza Sakit and Einullah Fatullaev are still behind bars, as Ms Yunus has noted. She has emphasized, that the issue of a Special Rapporteur on political prisoners remains topical after this pardon.