Azeri rights defenders treat number of pardoned political prisoners as insufficient

The President of Azerbaijan has pardoned 213 people. Human rights defenders have treated his decision as a "half-way one", since only a small part of the country's political prisoners have been pardoned.

On May 27, the Azerbaijani President, Ilham Aliev, signed a pardoning decree: 168 prisoners are released from jails, including one life convict. Other 36 convicts will have their remaining prison terms halved. Three convicts are released from conditional imprisonment; six others – from the punishment in the form of freedom restriction.

The list of those pardoned includes over 20 persons from the list of political prisoners. In particular, there are Salekh Rustamov, an opposition supporter; Afghan Sadygov and Bakhruz Aliev, journalists; Pasha Umudov, a PFPA (Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan) member; and 19 convicts under the Ganja case, among them.

Elshan Gasanov, a co-rapporteur of the Union "For Freedom to Political Prisoners", has expressed his regret that the pardoning covered only a small number of political prisoners. "Unfortunately, the current pardoning, like previous ones, has failed to solve political prisoners' problems. Out of 126 of them (according to the list compiled by the Union), only a little more than 20 are released," Mr Gasanov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on May 27, 2022 at 07:59 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.