Tweet
Spears: Exhibition `Fly to Baku is PR' of repressive regime in Azerbaijan
20:39 08/04/2013 » SOCIETY
A travelling exhibition of Azerbaijani Contemporary art which has made
stops in London, Berlin, Moscow and Rome, before ending up in Baku is
a simply PR for a cash-rich authoritarian government of Azerbaijan,
Josh Spers writes in the British article Spears.
`The whole concept of Fly to Baku makes me uneasy, however: isn't it
simply PR for a cash-rich authoritarian government, using art to
distract from a regime of repression?' the author of the article
wonders.
According to him, the position of Azerbaijani artists cannot be so
different from that of Azerbaijani writers, who are restricted -
explicitly or by inference - in what they can write and beaten when
they flout the restrictions, according to a report from Human Rights
Watch called `Beaten, Blacklisted and Behind Bars'.
He brings an extract from the Human Rights Watch: `The government of
Azerbaijan is engaged in concerted efforts to limit the space for
freedom of expression in the country... Dozens of journalists have
been prosecuted and imprisoned or fined. Police and sometimes
unidentified assailants are able to physically attack journalists and
human rights defenders with impunity.'
In tune with this, the art in Fly to Baku is negligible in its
political content, perhaps because of a self-exercised censorship.
As Spero says, perhaps, Fly to Baku's artists have in their attics
radical art which deals with repression and dictatorship and a ruling
family which spends the country's money on vanity projects abroad.
The author quotes the journal Private Eye and says that `During the
past year at least 11 MPs, plus several peers, have benefited from the
Azeris' `caviar diplomacy'. This usually involves no-expense-spared
junkets to Baku.'
The Eye noted how, `British politicians are unusually favourable to
Azerbaijan in the Council of Europe, `despite its consistent flouting
of decisions by the European Court of Human Rights'.'
`So it's art and caviar diplomacy for some, and jail for others. Fly
to Baku? Easy. Just watch what you say when you're there,' the article
says.
In May 1012 the "European Stability Initiative" published a study
entitled "Caviar Diplomacy: How Azerbaijan got the silence of the
Council of Europe" which was showed the detailed chronology and
mechanisms of bribing the members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Council of Europe by the ruling regime in Azerbaijan.
Source: Panorama.am
20:39 08/04/2013 » SOCIETY
A travelling exhibition of Azerbaijani Contemporary art which has made
stops in London, Berlin, Moscow and Rome, before ending up in Baku is
a simply PR for a cash-rich authoritarian government of Azerbaijan,
Josh Spers writes in the British article Spears.
`The whole concept of Fly to Baku makes me uneasy, however: isn't it
simply PR for a cash-rich authoritarian government, using art to
distract from a regime of repression?' the author of the article
wonders.
According to him, the position of Azerbaijani artists cannot be so
different from that of Azerbaijani writers, who are restricted -
explicitly or by inference - in what they can write and beaten when
they flout the restrictions, according to a report from Human Rights
Watch called `Beaten, Blacklisted and Behind Bars'.
He brings an extract from the Human Rights Watch: `The government of
Azerbaijan is engaged in concerted efforts to limit the space for
freedom of expression in the country... Dozens of journalists have
been prosecuted and imprisoned or fined. Police and sometimes
unidentified assailants are able to physically attack journalists and
human rights defenders with impunity.'
In tune with this, the art in Fly to Baku is negligible in its
political content, perhaps because of a self-exercised censorship.
As Spero says, perhaps, Fly to Baku's artists have in their attics
radical art which deals with repression and dictatorship and a ruling
family which spends the country's money on vanity projects abroad.
The author quotes the journal Private Eye and says that `During the
past year at least 11 MPs, plus several peers, have benefited from the
Azeris' `caviar diplomacy'. This usually involves no-expense-spared
junkets to Baku.'
The Eye noted how, `British politicians are unusually favourable to
Azerbaijan in the Council of Europe, `despite its consistent flouting
of decisions by the European Court of Human Rights'.'
`So it's art and caviar diplomacy for some, and jail for others. Fly
to Baku? Easy. Just watch what you say when you're there,' the article
says.
In May 1012 the "European Stability Initiative" published a study
entitled "Caviar Diplomacy: How Azerbaijan got the silence of the
Council of Europe" which was showed the detailed chronology and
mechanisms of bribing the members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Council of Europe by the ruling regime in Azerbaijan.
Source: Panorama.am