In Azerbaijan, two oppositionists arrested for 30 days

Yashar Farazi and Rakhib Gurbanov, activists of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), are arrested for 30 days on the charge of disobeying the police. A PFPA member has associated the arrests of his party colleagues with the authorities' desire to prevent protest actions by intimidating oppositionists.

Yashar Farazi, an activist of the PFPA unit in the Nasimi District, was detained in the Absheron District not far from Baku. Law enforcers took him away with them from the house on July 4, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was informed by Ilham Gusein, a member of the Supreme Majlis of the PFPA.

"In the afternoon, relatives have learned that the Absheron District Court pronounced the decision to arrest Yashar Farazi for 30 days. He was found guilty under the article on failure to obey to lawful requirements of the police: he allegedly used bad words in the street and when policemen called him on to stop doing that, he refused to obey," Ilham Gusein said.

On July 4, Rakhib Gurbanov, the deputy chair of the PFPA unit in the Surakhani District, was arrested on a similar charge. He was taken to a local police station, and by evening, the court sentenced the activist to 30 days of arrest, Ilham Gusein reported.

"We treat the arrests of our activists as a political order. The authorities are afraid of public discontent, and they periodically 'preventively' subject our activists to administrative arrests in order to prevent protests," Ilham Gusein said.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on July 5, 2018 at 02:04 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.