{"id":1257,"date":"2015-01-30T13:15:34","date_gmt":"2015-01-30T13:15:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1257"},"modified":"2015-02-02T13:24:06","modified_gmt":"2015-02-02T13:24:06","slug":"well-known-journalist-gets-five-years-on-absurd-charge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1257","title":{"rendered":"Well-known journalist gets five years on absurd charge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reporters Without Borders<\/em><\/p>\n

The latest victim of the crackdown that the authorities began last summer is the well-known journalist Seymour Khazi, who was sentenced to five years in prison on a trumped-up charge of aggravated hooliganism<\/a> at the end of a sham trial yesterday.<\/p>\n

\"Seymour<\/a>
Seymour Khazi (Photo: Radio Azadlig)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A reporter for the opposition daily Azadlig and one of the presenters of \u201cAzerbaycan Saati,\u201d a TV programme critical of the government that is broadcast from abroad, he had been in pre-trial detention for the past five months.<\/p>\n

Reporters Without Borders is appalled by the absurdity of this verdict and its tragic consequences.<\/p>\n

Khazi (whose full surname is Khaziyev) was arrested<\/a> on a hooliganism charge on 29 August after defending himself when suddenly attacked by a complete stranger, Maherram Hasanov. After an outcry, Hasanov was also arrested for hooliganism five days later.<\/p>\n

At yesterday\u2019s trial, marked by a lack of evidence and many procedural errors, the prosecution requested<\/a> six years for Khazi and nine months for his assailant, who ended up being sentenced to six months in prison.<\/p>\n

Khazi repeatedly denounced the charges as politically motivated. Before the court issued its verdict yesterday, he accused President Ilham Aliyev and chief of staff Ramiz Mehdyev of ordering his arrest.<\/p>\n

Outspoken journalists and civil society representatives have been the victims of an unprecedented crackdown since last summer.<\/p>\n

On 19 January, Khazi released a letter paying tribute<\/a> to Azerbaijan\u2019s leading independent journalist, Khadija Ismayilova, who was arrested<\/a> on 5 December and was being held in a cell just a few metres from his.<\/p>\n

Previous releases by Reporters Without Borders on this subject:<\/p>\n

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Reporters Without Borders The latest victim of the crackdown that the authorities began last summer is the well-known journalist Seymour Khazi, who was sentenced to [more >>>]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1258,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1257","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-azerbaijan","category-azerbaijan-human-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1257"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1259,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257\/revisions\/1259"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}