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AZERBAIJANI LEADERS LOVE THE KARABAKH CONFLICT, INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST TELLS BBC
http://www.armradio.am/en/2013/05/30/azerbaijani-leaders-love-the-karabakh-conflict-investigative-journalist-tells-bbc/
15:05 30.05.2013
"I try not to cry so that I can be strong for my son," mathematics
teacher Sakina Gurbanova tells BBC's Damien McGuinness, struggling
to hold back the tears, as she shows me a picture of her son.
A handsome, smiling 27-year-old law graduate, Zaur was pulled off the
street by plain-clothed policemen on 1 April. Since then he has been
in jail awaiting trial, accused of possessing arms.
But his mother says their home was never searched for weapons and
that he is being punished for criticising the government.
According to human rights groups, the charges are trumped up - an
authoritarian government's attempt to stamp out any Arab Spring-style
uprising, they say. And now, faced with presidential elections in
October, the authorities are accused of clamping down even more
heavily.
New regulations mean that participants in anti-government
demonstrations in the city centre face heavy fines worth more than
the yearly earning of many Azeris. And tough new libel laws are
criminalizing criticism online.
"The Azeri government is seen by critics as not only humourless but
also nervous," Damien McGuinness writes.
"I think the president's family is using the nationalist card to
distract people from the real problems, such as corruption," says
investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova. "They need an external
enemy to keep people under control."
"And in Azerbaijan, that enemy is Armenia. Earlier this year, just as
the country was seeing an unusually high number of anti-government
protests, a scandal erupted over an Azeri book which portrayed
Armenians sympathetically. Fortuitous timing to distract from the
unrest, whispered government critics. The novel had actually been
published months before," the article reads.
Its author, the renowned Azeri writer Akram Aylisli, was stripped of
his literary awards and pension by President Aliyev. His books were
publicly burned and protesters gathered outside his home chanting
death threats - demonstrations which the authorities did not disperse.
This once-revered writer suddenly found himself castigated as a
national villain. "What is the government afraid of?" the elderly
writer said, shaking his head sadly, when I visited him in his
Baku home.
Azeri soldier Ramil Safarov, on the other hand, was turned into the
nation's hero. He chopped the head off a sleeping Armenian with an
axe in 2004 in Hungary. Last year he returned to Azerbaijan, where he
was supposed to serve out the rest of a life sentence. Only he did
not. He was given a hero's welcome, was pardoned by the president
and promoted to the rank of major, the article reminds.
"Of course he's a hero," one of Ramil Safarov's neighbours told BBC's
Damien McGuinness.
"Armenians aren't human," another said. "I would have done the same."
"I think the leaders just love this conflict, they embrace it,"
the journalist Khadija Ismayilova believes. "The right thing to do
right now would be to embrace Armenian citizens in Azerbaijan. But
that would end the conflict. And the government doesn't want that."
Read the entire article by Damien McGuinness.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22690649
http://www.armradio.am/en/2013/05/30/azerbaijani-leaders-love-the-karabakh-conflict-investigative-journalist-tells-bbc/
15:05 30.05.2013
"I try not to cry so that I can be strong for my son," mathematics
teacher Sakina Gurbanova tells BBC's Damien McGuinness, struggling
to hold back the tears, as she shows me a picture of her son.
A handsome, smiling 27-year-old law graduate, Zaur was pulled off the
street by plain-clothed policemen on 1 April. Since then he has been
in jail awaiting trial, accused of possessing arms.
But his mother says their home was never searched for weapons and
that he is being punished for criticising the government.
According to human rights groups, the charges are trumped up - an
authoritarian government's attempt to stamp out any Arab Spring-style
uprising, they say. And now, faced with presidential elections in
October, the authorities are accused of clamping down even more
heavily.
New regulations mean that participants in anti-government
demonstrations in the city centre face heavy fines worth more than
the yearly earning of many Azeris. And tough new libel laws are
criminalizing criticism online.
"The Azeri government is seen by critics as not only humourless but
also nervous," Damien McGuinness writes.
"I think the president's family is using the nationalist card to
distract people from the real problems, such as corruption," says
investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova. "They need an external
enemy to keep people under control."
"And in Azerbaijan, that enemy is Armenia. Earlier this year, just as
the country was seeing an unusually high number of anti-government
protests, a scandal erupted over an Azeri book which portrayed
Armenians sympathetically. Fortuitous timing to distract from the
unrest, whispered government critics. The novel had actually been
published months before," the article reads.
Its author, the renowned Azeri writer Akram Aylisli, was stripped of
his literary awards and pension by President Aliyev. His books were
publicly burned and protesters gathered outside his home chanting
death threats - demonstrations which the authorities did not disperse.
This once-revered writer suddenly found himself castigated as a
national villain. "What is the government afraid of?" the elderly
writer said, shaking his head sadly, when I visited him in his
Baku home.
Azeri soldier Ramil Safarov, on the other hand, was turned into the
nation's hero. He chopped the head off a sleeping Armenian with an
axe in 2004 in Hungary. Last year he returned to Azerbaijan, where he
was supposed to serve out the rest of a life sentence. Only he did
not. He was given a hero's welcome, was pardoned by the president
and promoted to the rank of major, the article reminds.
"Of course he's a hero," one of Ramil Safarov's neighbours told BBC's
Damien McGuinness.
"Armenians aren't human," another said. "I would have done the same."
"I think the leaders just love this conflict, they embrace it,"
the journalist Khadija Ismayilova believes. "The right thing to do
right now would be to embrace Armenian citizens in Azerbaijan. But
that would end the conflict. And the government doesn't want that."
Read the entire article by Damien McGuinness.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22690649