A group of international organizations and Azerbaijani NGOs presented a statement to the delegations of the countries that joined summer session of PACE.
The situation of human rights and democracy in Azerbaijan was addressed in the statement. The information regarding the cases of Eynulla Fatullayev, and bloggers Emin Milli (Abdullayev) and Adnan Hajizade was also included in the statement, which tackled issues that included the violation of freedom of assembly, and the lack of an independent court system.
Besides the joint statement, a document including information regarding amendments and changes to the resolution on the operation of democratic institutes in Azerbaijan was presented to the delegations. The organizations that signed the document called on PACE Members to include separate items in the resolution to find the murderers of “Monitor” journal editor-in-chief Elmar Huseynov and bring them to responsibility, and to secure fair and transparent elections.
The resolution regarding the operation of democratic institutes in Azerbaijan was prepared by PACE Monitoring Committee Co-rapporteurs on Azerbaijan Andreas Herkel (Estonia) and Joseph Debono Grech (Malta). The adoption of the resolution will depend on the delegations’ votes, and the voting will be held after this document is discussed on 24 June.
The appeal was signed by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, the Human Rights House Fund (Norway), ARTICLE 19 (Great Britain), the Poland Helsinki Fund, the International Human Rights Federation (France), the Raphto Fund (Norway), the Centre for Human Rights (Georgia) and organizations from Azerbaijan – the Institute Peace and Democracy, the Law Enlightenment Society, the Centre for Human Rights, the Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety, the Support to Economics Public Association, the Media Rights Institute, the FAR Centre, the “Democracy Monitor” Society, the Defense Society for Women’s Rights, and the Society for Rational Development.
The joint statement and the documents attached to it were presented to the delegations of PACE by a group of human rights defenders representing some of the abovementioned organizations, and discussions were held with the delegations. The group includes the following people: Berit Lindeman, Vugar Gojayev (the Norwegian Helsinki Committee), Rebecca Vinsent (ARTICLE 19), Florian Irminger (the Human Rights House Fund), and Rasul Jafarov (the Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety).