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An Azerbaijani human rights activist Leyla Yunus held without trial since July had her detention extended for five months by a court in Baku. She has been detained on charges of treason, espionage and tax evasion, told the Reuters her lawyer Elchin Gambarov.

As the RFE/RL stated Yunus' health is reported to have severely declined in detention. Her lawyers say she has been subjected to beatings and denied medical care for advanced liver disease.

The topic of extending the pre-trial detention of human rights defender was also touched upon by the edition of “Jurist” and “AllmediaNY”, and the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders which is a joint program of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) called on the Azerbaijani authorities to provide her medical care and immediately release her.

Meanwhile “The Washington Post” published a letter written by the arrested Azerbaijani journalist Khadija Ismayilova, which she had sent from the jail through mediators.

In her letter she had noted that the last letter she was sent to punishment cell, and all her notes were taken away by the warders and were not returned. “I guess there are many devoted readers of mine at the penitentiary. That is why it is taking them such a long time to return what they have taken from me.”

She also reports that she is allowed to make two phone calls each week that she uses to speak with her mother, but, contrary to the law, denies her and the lawyer regular visits. In addition she has access to very little information.

“Corruption is the reason I am in my prison, but the regime’s corruption, not mine. The only way to prove oppressive regimes wrong is to continue exposing corruption, and I have promised more investigations for 2015. Yes, there is a price to pay, but it is worth it!” the journalist writes.

She also writes that in a country in a country where unpunished crimes are at a record high and deeply rooted in all levels of government, there is a simple logic that prompts people to commit crimes. “If it is good, why can’t I do it?; if it is bad, why are they doing it?” This is the mentality bred by a morally bankrupt regime that has turned my country’s justice system into a corrupt machine.

“This a country where money and power can cover up any crime, and where truth and deception have traded places. As a result, there are some 100 political prisoners behind bars in Azerbaijan,” Ismayilova stresses.

IWPR has prepared a material on the Azerbaijani political prisoners. The 2015 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders ranks Azerbaijan alongside the likes of Rwanda (161), Saudi Arabia (164), Uzbekistan (166), Turkmenistan (178), Cuba (169), North Korea (179) and the worst violator of press freedom, Eritrea (180), it reads. Azerbaijan’s regional neighbours Armenia and Georgia performed much better, and were ranked 78th and 69th, respectively.

The article touches also the issue of Seymur Hezi saying that on January 29, a court sentenced Seymur Hezi, a journalist and opposition member, to five years in prisonHis lawyer Adil Ismailov, supported by witnesses who testified in court, argued that Hezi had done nothing wrong. His legal team said he was attacked by a man and hit back in self-defence with a water bottle.
“My grandfathers were purged in 1937. Now we are being purged by a system created by KGB general Heydar Aliyev [late president, succeeded by his son Ilham Aliyev],” he said. “Ours is not a struggle between government and opposition, it is a struggle between good and evil,” Hezi stated.

The article also notes that it emerged this month that Emin Huseynov, a rights defender and director of the Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety (IRFS) in Baku, has been hiding out at the Swiss embassy in Azerbaijan since August. Huseynov took refuge in the embassy after the Azerbaijani authorities froze IRFS’s bank accounts, searched its offices, and seized equipment and documents.

Global Network Initiative made a statement in this connection. “The Azerbaijani government is persecuting Emin Huseynov for the same reasons that international human rights organizations work with him: his tireless efforts to protect journalists and defend online freedoms. They should immediately drop the charges against him and other imprisoned reporters and activists,” said GNI Board Chair Mark Stephens.