Jailed Azerbaijani journalist Aytaj Ahmadova, detained under the controversial Meydan TV smuggling case, has had her telephone contact with friends cut off by prison authorities, her family has said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ms Ahmadova’s family told the independent media outlet Meydan TV that her scheduled weekly call on Monday was abruptly disconnected as soon as she began speaking to her friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The family said they were unable to re-establish contact with her for the rest of the day, and their repeated calls to the detention facility went unanswered. Telephone contact was only restored the following day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Aytaj has already been unjustly imprisoned,” her family said in a statement. “What does it mean to now deprive her of a simple telephone conversation with her friends?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ms Ahmadova is one of several independent journalists and civil society figures detained in Azerbaijan in connection with the Meydan TV case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first wave of arrests took place on 6 December 2024, targeting activist Ulvi Tahirov and journalists Ramin Deko, Aynur Ganbarova, Aysel Umudova, Khayala Agayeva, Natiq Javadli, and Ms Ahmadova herself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Further arrests followed throughout 2025, including editor Shamshad Aghayev on 5 February, Nurlan Libre on 20 February, Fatima Movlamli on 28 February, Ulviyya Ali on 7 May, and Ahmad Mukhtar on 27 August.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The detainees were initially charged with smuggling as part of an organised group under Article 206.3.2 of the Azerbaijani Criminal Code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, on 28 August 2025, prosecution authorities upgraded the charges. The journalists now face a total of seven criminal counts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The detained journalists deny all allegations, stating that the charges are politically motivated and aimed at silencing independent media and free expression in Azerbaijan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jailed Azerbaijani journalist Aytaj Ahmadova, detained under the controversial Meydan TV smuggling case, has had her telephone contact with friends cut off by prison authorities, her family has said. Ms Ahmadova’s family told the independent media outlet Meydan TV that her scheduled weekly call on Monday was abruptly disconnected as soon as she began speaking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":31637,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1047],"class_list":["post-31635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-feed","tag-editor"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31635"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31638,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31635\/revisions\/31638"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.irfs.org\/az\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}