Azerbaijan: Imprisoned Defender Denied Health Care
Anar Mammadli, a prominent human rights defender and Head of the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre. He is a co-founder of the Climate of Justice Initiative, a newly established group looking into the promotion of civic space and environmental justice within the 29th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP29), which will take place in Baku, November 2024. He was among the first activists in Azerbaijan who linked respect for human rights and climate justice and was actively involved in international advocacy at the UN Human Rights Council and the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe. On 29 April 2024, Anar Mammadli was on the way to pick up his child from nursery when he was apprehended by unidentified masked men and driven away in a black vehicle. According to family members, police then searched Anar Mammadli s house and allegedly planted money. The Ministry of Internal Affairs confirmed his detention, and his sister reported that he is officially suspected of “smuggling by prior conspiracy by a group of persons” under Article 206.3.2 of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan.
He was reportedly denied access to his lawyer overnight when kept in a temporary detention centre in Baku. On 30 April 2024, Khatai District Court of Baku ruled to place him in pre-trial detention until the end of August 2024. Baku Appellate Court considered an appeal against the arrest of Anar Mammadli on 6 May, but the appeal wasn’t granted.
On October 7, 2024, Anar Mammadli personally, in a handwriting application that included an official attached application by his lawyers, applied to the Chief Medical Department of the Ministry of Justice, the Penitentiary Service, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Human Rights Commissioner and requested to undergo a thorough examination in a civil private hospital.
Subsequently, Anar Mammadli underwent some medical checkups in the detention facility. The Ombudsperson Office has requested the result of the checkups from the authorities. However, the lawyers and Anar Mammadli have not been given access to the results.
In 2014 Anar Mammadli was recognized as a Prisoner of Conscience by Amnesty International when he was given a five-and-a-half-year prison sentence on trumped-up charges of tax evasion, illegal entrepreneurship, and abuse of office. While in prison he received the Václav Havel Human Rights Prize from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) for his outstanding contributions to civil society in defending human rights. The European Court of Human Rights stated that his arrest in 2013 was a violation of articles 5 and 1 (right to liberty and security); 5 and 4 (right to have lawfulness of detention decided speedily by a court); 18 (limitation on use of restrictions on rights), finding that his arrest and detention was aimed at silencing his criticism. The Azerbaijani authorities have not to date fully complied with the judgment, failing to quash his conviction and restore his civil and political rights.
He was pardoned in 2016 but has since faced repeated attacks from the authorities and the pro-government media, intensifying in the lead-up to COP29. The current detention of Anar Mammadli follows a pattern of abuse of the criminal justice system aimed at silencing government critics including human rights defenders, political activists, journalists and other critical voices in Azerbaijan, including the academic and anti-corruption activist Gubad Ibadoghlu, Third Republic board member Akif Gurbanov and founder of Toplum TV Alasgar Mammadli. In addition, more than 20 journalists remain in detention. Among them are journalists and media workers from the outlets Abzas Media, Toplum TV and Kanal 13.