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Agence France Presse -- English
June 25, 2005 Saturday 3:02 PM GMT
Opposition protests in Azerbaijan's capital
BAKU June 25
About 1,500 supporters of Azerbaijan's opposition joined a
demonstration in the capital Baku on Saturday to demand that
parliamentary elections planned for November will be free and fair.
The demonstrators, who represented some of Azerbaijan's smaller but
more radical opposition groups, chanted "resign" to the ruling
government of President Ilham Aliyev.
Protestors threatened to launch permanent street protests if a list
of demands -- including halving the 11,000-dollar registration fee
required for candidates to participate -- is not fulfilled within a
month.
"The authorities must carry out democratic reforms or they will force
us to stage a revolution, in accordance with the constitution," said
Iskander Gamidov, the leader of Azerbaijan's National Democratic
Party, and a former political prisoner.
Protesters also demanded that authorities reverse their policy of
negotiations in relation to the separatist Nagorno Karabakh region,
which Azerbaijan lost to Armenian forces in an early 1990s war.
"We must go to war to liberate our lands and return them at the cost
of blood and the loss of life," Gamidov said through a loudspeaker.
Public gatherings such as this one had been prevented from taking
place by the regime since contested presidential elections in 2003
ended in rioting in which two people died. Azerbaijan recently lifted
the unofficial ban on protests under Western pressure.
Earlier attempts at holding opposition rallies were violently quashed
by the police, notably in May when scores of protestors were beaten
and arrested after trying to march in central Baku.
Human rights observers have accused Aliyev's government of using mass
arrests, as well as torture, to quell opposition.
June 25, 2005 Saturday 3:02 PM GMT
Opposition protests in Azerbaijan's capital
BAKU June 25
About 1,500 supporters of Azerbaijan's opposition joined a
demonstration in the capital Baku on Saturday to demand that
parliamentary elections planned for November will be free and fair.
The demonstrators, who represented some of Azerbaijan's smaller but
more radical opposition groups, chanted "resign" to the ruling
government of President Ilham Aliyev.
Protestors threatened to launch permanent street protests if a list
of demands -- including halving the 11,000-dollar registration fee
required for candidates to participate -- is not fulfilled within a
month.
"The authorities must carry out democratic reforms or they will force
us to stage a revolution, in accordance with the constitution," said
Iskander Gamidov, the leader of Azerbaijan's National Democratic
Party, and a former political prisoner.
Protesters also demanded that authorities reverse their policy of
negotiations in relation to the separatist Nagorno Karabakh region,
which Azerbaijan lost to Armenian forces in an early 1990s war.
"We must go to war to liberate our lands and return them at the cost
of blood and the loss of life," Gamidov said through a loudspeaker.
Public gatherings such as this one had been prevented from taking
place by the regime since contested presidential elections in 2003
ended in rioting in which two people died. Azerbaijan recently lifted
the unofficial ban on protests under Western pressure.
Earlier attempts at holding opposition rallies were violently quashed
by the police, notably in May when scores of protestors were beaten
and arrested after trying to march in central Baku.
Human rights observers have accused Aliyev's government of using mass
arrests, as well as torture, to quell opposition.