News

Canada-based blogger Imran Asadov was reportedly detained after arriving in Azerbaijan. Asadov, who owns a YouTube channel, openly targeted activists who were against the Karabakh war, which took place in 2020 during the 44-day war.  During questioning, and likely under duress, all of the videos on Asadov’s YouTube channel were removed. Wayback machine shows that […]

[Update December 4] Following arrests of Kekalov, Vagifgizi and Hasanli, three more journalists were arrested. Among them are Nargiz Abusalamova (Abzas Media reporter), Aziz Orujov (founder of online television channel Kanal 13), and Rufat Muradli (the host of the show on Kanal 13). There were also reports of a hacking attempt into Kanal 13 youtube […]

Afiaddin Mammadov, the coordinator of Azerbaijan’s Alternative Confederation of Trade Unions, was sentenced to two months in pretrial detention in September 2023. Charged with deliberate infliction of bodily harm and armed hooliganism (based on a bogus accusation by an unidentified man claiming Mammadov stabbed him with a knife) originally, based on the hearing on November […]

[Update] Reports from Fuzuli confirm, that internet access has been restored as of October 24, 2023. Residents say that despite almost a month-long throttling, they have noticed the cash balance on their accounts has been withdrawn even though there was no internet access. Of the companies providing Internet access in Fuzuli, only Aztelekom has thus […]

[Update] Dia.az website was reportedly blocked inside the country following the court decision on November 15. The Media Development Agency filed the case with the court on November 10 [see the following update below]. The site’s manager considers the court’s decision unlawful. Zamanov told Meydan TV he will be appealing the decision. In an interview […]

[Update] Authorities continued to target civic activists critical of the state during October. Below is a compilation of some the cases documented by AIW.  October 27 – Tural Farzili was detained after a post on Facebook in which he questioned the arrest of members of the working group representing the rights of workers. Farzili was […]

[Update] Access to TikTok was restored as of October 31, according to reports. The access was restored together with a call from the Cyber Security Service asking users to comply with the requirements of the legislation of the Republic of Azerbaijan and the rules and conditions set by social network administrators when sharing on social […]

On September 13, the court in Baku ruled in favor of blocking access to the YouTube channel of an online news site “Hürriyyət” [Hurriyyet]. The decision was based on the request from the General Prosecutor’s Office.  The court in its ruling said the news site violated the law on Information, informatization, and protection of information, […]

Blogger Jamil Mammadli is facing multiple charges including fraud, hooliganism, and extortion, and has been placed in administrative detention pending investigation according to reports by local media. The allegations leveled against the blogger claim that Mammadli allegedly influenced the participants of the trial and spread insulting posts about them on social networks.  As such, according […]

A confession from journalist Elmaddin Shamilzadeh about the forced removal of social media posts under duress is a testament to persistent violence and intimidation used in Azerbaijan against civic groups. According to the reporting by Voice of America, Shamilzadeh was severely beaten by law enforcement during his detention last month. After the journalist agreed to […]