Azerbaijan’s authorities has been accused of cracking down on media and civil society activism earlier than the nation’s internet hosting of essential UN local weather talks later this yr.
Human Rights Watch has discovered at the least 25 situations of the arrest or sentencing of journalists and activists previously yr, nearly all of whom stay in custody.
Many campaigners and civil society teams have spoken of their considerations that local weather advocacy was being stifled amid a media clampdown. Azerbaijan will host the UN Cop29 climate summit over two weeks in November, when practically 200 governments, together with dozens of heads of state, are anticipated to thrash out a brand new international method to offering the funds wanted to deal with the local weather disaster.
Azerbaijan, an authoritarian state the place media and civic freedoms are curtailed, is regarded as one of the world’s most corrupt countries, coming 154th out of 180 states in a rating by Transparency Worldwide final yr. There may be little efficient political opposition and the president, Ilham Aliyev, gained greater than 92% of the vote in elections in February to take a fifth consecutive time period. His father was Heydar Aliyev, who led the nation below Soviet rule and was put in as president after a army coup in 1993 adopted the breakup of the japanese bloc.
Azerbaijan can also be accused of holding political prisoners. A battle with neighbouring Armenia final yr over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh area ended with 100,000 people being displaced from their homes.
Considered one of Aliyev’s prime advisers said a few weeks ago that the federal government meant to make Cop29 a “Cop of peace”, and to name for a Cop truce wherein hostilities can be suspended all over the world in the course of the talks.
Campaigners raised their considerations at a pre-Cop29 assembly of governments in Bonn, the place the secretariat for the UN Framework Conference on Local weather Change (UNFCCC) is predicated. Officers from all over the world are within the midst of two weeks of conferences to debate the important thing points that can dominate the Cop29 summit, together with the vexed query of the right way to present ample finance to assist the creating world reduce greenhouse gasoline emissions and address the impacts of world heating.
A protest was held on the entrance to the Bonn talks on Friday night – the midpoint of the discussions – calling for the discharge of 23 Armenian political prisoners held in Azerbaijan. Some protesters accused the federal government of genocide.
Myrto Tilianaki, a senior environmental advocate at Human Rights Watch, highlighted the case of Anar Mammadli, a member of the Human Rights Homes community, who was arrested on 29 April on smuggling costs. He’s a founding father of the Local weather of Justice Initiative, which goals to make use of Cop29 to push for environmental justice in Azerbaijan.
Ibad Bayramov is campaigning for the discharge of his father, Gubad Ibadoghlu, a analysis fellow on the London College of Economics and civil rights activist, who was imprisoned last summer and whose well being has badly deteriorated, requiring pressing medical therapy which his household say he isn’t receiving.
Bayramov stated: “Cop29 lends legitimacy on the world stage to the federal government’s illegitimate imprisonment of my father. As his well being has deteriorated to excessive ranges, western governments proceed to satisfy weekly with their Azerbaijani counterparts concerning Cop29. Significant progress on local weather change can’t be achieved in a rustic the place people like my father are imprisoned and tortured for talking out.”
Paul Polman, a former CEO of Unilever who now campaigns on climate and human rights issues, stated he needed to make use of Cop29 as a chance for the worldwide neighborhood to speak about Azerbaijan’s therapy of prisoners, about which he has critical considerations. “I hope that Cop29 can be utilized as a gap,” he stated. “Nevertheless it’s appalling that human rights has not been on the agenda. After Cop29, there is not going to be a highlight on Azerbaijan’s report.”
Azerbaijan’s authorities has rebutted the activists’ claims. A spokesperson stated: “We completely reject the claims about [a] crackdown towards human rights activists and journalists in Azerbaijan. Nobody is persecuted in Azerbaijan due to political opinions or actions.
“As in any rule-of-law based mostly society, any detention or imprisonment of an individual who’s suspected in unlawful actions is topic to the necessities of investigation and honest trial, based mostly on related legal guidelines and rules. As an alternative of ready for the outcomes of legal circumstances and investigations, in addition to courtroom rulings … to name on Azerbaijan to launch suspects is in open contradiction with authorized procedures.
“As Cop29 president, Azerbaijan lays out its imaginative and prescient and pillars for a profitable yr of local weather negotiations, encouraging an open and direct dialogue amongst all nations, and we imagine all of the layers of society ought to contribute to profitable efforts to deal with the local weather change problem.”
Azerbaijan’s presidency follows two different consecutive Cops – the time period stands for convention of the events, below the UNFCCC, the 1992 parent treaty to the Paris agreement – in international locations with authoritarian leaders and poor information on human rights: the United Arab Emirates hosted Cop28 in Dubai last year, the place protests had been muted, and Egypt hosted Cop27 in 2022. The UN ensures some freedom of expression for protesters throughout the confines of the Cop through the fortnight it runs, however has little affect on the hosts’ behaviour exterior its precincts.
Tilianaki stated: “Holding Cop29 in Azerbaijan raises critical considerations about the potential of advancing bold local weather motion in negotiations. Governments attending the Bonn preparatory assembly ought to name out Azerbaijan for its repression of civil society and clarify that they may actively confront any makes an attempt to weaken sturdy local weather insurance policies.”