In Azerbaijan, public prosecutor demands two years of imprisonment for attacker on Halil

At the process in the Nasiminskiy District Court of Baku on the case of Sergey Strekalin, accused of attacking journalist of the "Azadlyg" (Freedom) newspaper Agil Halil, on July 14 Public Prosecutor Eldar Gamzaev asked the court to sentence the defendant to two years of imprisonment with serving the punishment in a general custody colony.

Elchin Sadygov, journalist's advocate, has state again that it was not Strekalin who inflicted a knife wound to Halil on March 13 this year. The lawyer has noted that Strekalin pled guilty with the aim "to hide the employees of the Ministry for National Security (MNS), who stand behind the crimes against Halil, from responsibility." In his opinion, the court has actually failed to hold the trial and completely upheld the version of the investigation.

The journalist himself has treated the trial as "inspired" and "a dirty show", as a result of which "an innocent person" is brought to responsibility.

In his turn, Judge Shakhin Abdullaev has named Halil's utterance "a fruit of his imagination."

Strekalin himself just briefly repeated what he had said during the investigation, saying that his conflict with Halil was of "common" nature, and he had knifed the journalist because of abusive sms-messages sent by him. As he said, the case has no "customized" nature, and Halil, by making this sort of statements, just wants to "self-advertise."