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Fifteen people were arrested in Azerbaijan on the criminal case initiated in the course of the investigation of the activities of the Ministry of National Security (MNS) of Azerbaijan, APA news agency reports.

Arrest was used as a preventive measure against 15 people, and a written obligation not to leave the country was taken from several. Those detained are held in the jail of Baku Penitentiary Service of the Justice Ministry. In addition to MNS staffers, there are also officials of the Ministry of Communication and High Technologies among them.

Citing the newspaper Yeni Musavat, 1news.az reports that the detainees are held in solitary cells and only the state can provide them with lawyers. Among the charges brought against them, the newspaper highlights the Article 308.2 of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan (abuse of official powers, entailing heavy consequences or committed with the aim of influencing the election (referendum) results), which is punished by imprisonment for the term from three up to eight years with deprivation of the right to hold certain posts or to engage in certain activities for up to three years.

The newspaper’s sources say the reason the above-mentioned article was included in the case is the illegal surveillance of the MP candidates’ phone conversations and receiving information regarding the election process. The source points out that the conversations of the head of the Central Election Commission have long been under surveillance.

According to Minval.az, the arrests are directly connected with secret phone surveillance. The website suggests that the surveillance of conversations regarding elections could have been done to further circulate them in the Western TV channels or hand them to the opposition, hitting the authorities seriously.

The website reports that the Special State Protection Service is in charge of the investigation of the case, and the investigators of the Prosecutor General’s Office cannot deal with the process. Minval.az points out that there are no legislative grounds for the existence of special committees and agencies, which could control the security and defense agencies in Azerbaijan. Sulhaddin Akper, political analyst and former MNS staffer, argues this is also conditioned by the lack of authentic democracy in Azerbaijan.

Process of grouping cases regarding the MNS, which had remained closed for years, is currently underway in the Prosecutor General’s Office. Additional information about the criminal acts former MNS head Eldar Mahmudov committed during his 11-year term, is expected to be published after the elections. Reportedly, Mahmudov is currently under the authorities’ control. Despite the special operation in the MNS having been conducted secretly, some of Mahmudov’s people were able to flee the country anyway, and one of the people from his close circle is now in Denmark, according to the information received by Minval.az.

There are also reports about entrepreneurs’ illegal detention at the MNS. The ministry officials reportedly took bribes from them with the help of such trumped up charges as “phone conversations with Armenia.” Minval.az’s source reports that the MNS had instructed a person in Russia to call to a certain company in Baku and inquire about prices and products. The conversation was held in Russian and at the end of the conversation, the person mentioned being Armenian. After three days, the MNS conducted a special operation in that company and accused its head of phone conversation with Armenia and high treason. The MNS officials told the leadership of the companies that they could give them a life sentence on charges of high treason and took very huge bribes from them.

“The cases sent to the court found their reflection in the statistical information of the MNS about revealing and neutralizing people who had committed high treason. They recommended the President to award the person, who had stood out during the ‘special operation,’ with a medal or a title for the ‘courage.’ Meanwhile, they had a biased attitude to the MNS officials who had really been brave,” Minval.az points out.

According to Minval.az, one of the imprisoned entrepreneurs’ mother told Qazqazinfo.az that the MNS had groundlessly and illegally arrested her son in May 2013. She said her son had a small business. He imported dishes from Iran. The MNS officials had demanded 100 thousand manats from him, which he could not afford to pay. Subsequently, they accused him of illegal drug trafficking. “We wanted to hire a lawyer; still the MNS would not allow that. We have been going the MNS for a year and a half. They tortured my son and broke his leg. We reported about that, and as a result, they attributed one more charge, ‘high treason,’ to my son,” the entrepreneur’s mother said and added that her son, father of three daughters, is sentenced to life imprisonment.

The Union of the Veterans of the State Security of the Azerbaijan Republic (Alliance) sent a statement to Haqqin.az saying that a huge amount of problems has been accumulated regarding the national security agencies’ work; still they are not voiced due to the peculiarities of the work. “The most crucial factor influencing the effectiveness of the work of the national security agencies are the close ties with the people. It will be very difficult to recover the reputation and the society’s trust for that office, which has unfortunately gone beyond several stages of moral and professional degradation, losing its best representatives. Everything is possible, however,” the statement reads.

Azerbaijani political analyst Zardusht Alizadeh told Minval.az that the dismissals and arrests of the MNS officials ahead of the parliamentary elections in the country are natural, for the Azerbaijani Parliament does not decide anything. What is called a parliament in that country, is an absolute fiction.

Citing Milli.az, Day.az informs that General Nizami Shirinov, the head of the Main department of Military Counter-Intelligence of the MNS, who had fired 69 experienced MNS officials on his first working day, was dismissed for power abuse. According to Minval.az, dismissals are also taking place in all the departments of Azerbaijan Airlines (AZAL) in connection with the “MNS case.”

On 17 October 2015, President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, signed a decree to dismiss the Minister of National Security, Eldar Mahmudov Ahmad oglu, from his post. Reportedly, an investigation revealed that a group of high-ranking officials had been engaged in criminal actions against entrepreneurs for a long period and gained millions. The activities of the Azerbaijani business elite and well-known representatives of medium-sized business were surveilled with audio spying equipment on Minister Eldar Makhmudov’s order. The MNS generals took an active part in the process. Later, discrediting material was specially filed against those businesspersons, and consequently, the snatch squad of the MNS conducted illegal arrests of businesspeople on the leadership’s order.