“GEGHARD”
SCIENTIFIC ANALYTICAL
FOUNDATION
2025
2025
2025-01-23
As a rule, Baku refutes criticism by international human rights organizations, deeming them biased. Moreover, it often claims from various platforms that no one in Azerbaijan is persecuted for their political views, and therefore, there are no political prisoners in the country. However, a few days ago, the international human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) published its World Report 2025, which also addressed Azerbaijan, dividing the report into four sections: “Persecution of Government Critics,” “Freedom of Expression and Media,” “Torture and Ill-treatment,” and “Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.”
According to the report, the Azerbaijani government intensified its crackdown on domestic critics even in November, when it hosted the UN Climate Change COP29 conference. “In the months before the conference, authorities arrested dozens of individuals, including journalists, human rights defenders, and activists, on politically motivated charges. They continued to interfere with rights to freedom of expression, association, and assembly…Torture and ill-treatment in custody also persisted,’’ the report says.
The document also addresses the snap presidential and parliamentary elections held in Azerbaijan in February and September 2024. According to the report, these elections did not meet the standards of free and fair elections: “International observers found them “marked by the stifling of critical voices” and “devoid of competition.”
The authors of the report also addressed Azerbaijan's obligations concerning the right of return for Armenians of Artsakh: “Despite its stated commitments, Azerbaijan has not taken meaningful steps to ensure the right to return in safety and dignity for ethnic Armenians who fled Nagorno-Karabakh in September 2023 or to restore their property rights.”
The human rights organization reminded that the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly did to ratify the credentials of the Azerbaijani delegation, citing the government’s failure to fulfil “major commitments” it undertook.
Referring to Ilham Aliyev’s political opponents, activists, and journalists with opposition views, the organization's report stated that the authorities leveled false or spurious charges against them launching a new wave of persecutions and arrests. Moreover, a May 2024 presidential pardon did not include any individuals serving sentences on politically motivated charges.
Starting in November 2023, the authorities targeted at least three independent media platforms, Abzas Media, Toplum TV, and Kanal 13. “In August 2024, the authorities pressed additional criminal charges against Abzas Media journalists, including tax evasion, forgery of documents, and money laundering… In March, shortly after the presidential election, police raided the office of Toplum TV…” the report states.
The international human rights organization also addressed the torture of detainees, highlighting the brutal treatment of prisoners and detainees by police, including the extraction of confessions through electric shocks and severe beatings.
According to the document, not only individuals with opposition views but also those of diverse sexual orientations have been subjected to arrests, violence, and torture. For years, “they have faced ill-treatment, extortion, arbitrary detention… The continued to be targeted by police.”
At the beginning of 2025, in an interview with pro-government Azerbaijani media, Ilham Aliyev described the past year as “a year of great achievements.” Nevertheless, non-governmental press outlets face the reality in Azerbaijan, emphasizing the prevailing violence in the country, arrests of opposition figures, fabricated trials based on false accusations, and widespread repression. Numerous reports by international human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch (HRW), once again confirm the repressive measures implemented by the Aliyev regime and the deprivation of citizens’ right to free speech.