{"id":1444,"date":"2015-04-15T20:19:02","date_gmt":"2015-04-15T20:19:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1444"},"modified":"2015-04-15T20:19:02","modified_gmt":"2015-04-15T20:19:02","slug":"azerbaijan-eiti-downgrade-dents-bakus-image","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1444","title":{"rendered":"Azerbaijan: EITI Downgrade Dents Baku\u2019s Image"},"content":{"rendered":"

By GIORGI LOMSADZE
\neurasianet.org<\/em><\/p>\n

Azerbaijan\u2019s status in a prominent international transparency organization has been downgraded. Representatives of the group cited Baku\u2019s ongoing crackdown on individual liberties as the reason for the demotion.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Azerbaijan had been a member<\/a> of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, or EITI, since 2003. The organization comprises companies, governments and civil-society groups and is dedicated to promoting greater transparency about state revenues earned from energy extraction and mining operations. Also inherent in membership is a commitment by member states to uphold basic liberties, in particular freedom of the press and broad access to information.<\/p>\n

On April 14, EITI\u2019s board deemed Azerbaijan was falling short in fulfilling the group\u2019s obligations and downgraded the country from full member to candidate<\/a>. To have its membership restored, Baku needs to \u201censure that civil society in Azerbaijan can participate in the EITI in a meaningful way,\u201d the Norway-based group\u2019s chairperson, Clare Short, said.<\/p>\n

Azerbaijan\u2019s troubles with the EITI date back to 2013, when some organization representatives expressed concern about a crackdown on government critics<\/a>, and launched a probe into the country\u2019s commitment to the transparency standard.<\/p>\n

In the summer of 2014, a leading global watchdog group, Human Rights Watch, called for Azerbaijan\u2019s expulsion from EITI. \u201cAzerbaijan is blatantly violating EITI rules, and EITI cannot afford to be complicit in this hypocrisy,\u201d HRW representative Lisa Misol said<\/a> in an August 14 statement. Azerbaijani officials brushed off the attack<\/a>, asserting that questions concerning Baku\u2019s rights practices were beyond EITI\u2019s purview.<\/p>\n

EITI\u2019s April 14 downgrade of Azerbaijan can lead to the eventual suspension of Baku\u2019s membership. Azerbaijani authorities have not yet reacted to the news.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By GIORGI LOMSADZE eurasianet.org Azerbaijan\u2019s status in a prominent international transparency organization has been downgraded. Representatives of the group cited Baku\u2019s ongoing crackdown on individual [more >>>]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":917,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-azerbaijan","category-azerbaijan-human-rights"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/covcasbulletin.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Covcas-EITI-logo.jpg?fit=480%2C99&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444","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=1444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1445,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444\/revisions\/1445"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}