Human rights defenders’ requests to pardon Salekh Rustamov remain unanswered

The health state of Salekh Rustamov, who has been on hunger strike for the 17th day in a prison in Azerbaijan, has worsened, but he intends to refuse water, his advocate reports today. According to human rights defender Novella Djafaroglu, there is no response to an appeal to the President of Azerbaijan for pardoning.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that on November 6, Salekh Rustamov (also referred to in the media as Rustamli), an activist of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), went on a hunger strike to protest against the fact that he was not affected by the amnesty announced by the President of Azerbaijan on November 5 to the anniversary of the victory in the war in Karabakh. On November 19, the leaders of a number of NGOs, human rights groups, and the media appealed to the President of Azerbaijan with a request to release Salekh Rustamov.

On November 22, advocate Bakhruz Bairamov visited Salekh Rustamov at the medical institution of the Penitentiary Service. “Salekh Rustamov looked very sleepy. He spoke abruptly. It was completely impossible to understand some of his words. I felt that he already had neurological problems. Salekh Rustamov said that he was already tired of the hunger strike, and in order to ‘speed up the process’ he would also refuse to take water in the middle of the week. He said that he wants a ‘quick ending:’ to be released or to die,” the advocate told the “Caucasian Knot” correspondent.

The human rights defenders who twice appealed to the President of Azerbaijan with a request to pardon Salekh Rustamov also did not receive answers to their appeals. “So far, no reaction has been received to the appeal,” said Tezekhan Miralamli, a member of the “Line of Defence” NGO.

Novella Djafaroglu, a member of the Monitoring Group of Azerbaijani Human Rights Organizations, who signed the second appeal the President of Azerbaijan, also reported that they also got no specific response to the petition.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on November 22, 2021 at 02:53 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.