Azerbaijan sentences blogger Lapshin to 3 years in prison
Russian-Israeli blogger Alexander Lapshin, who is in Baku custody, has been sentenced to 3 years in prison by the Baku Court of Grave Crimes on Thursday, according to RIA Novosti.
Earlier, a state prosecutor demanded a 6.5-year prison term for the blogger.
To remind, Alexander Lapshin was extradited from Belarus to Azerbaijan in February, where he was wanted after visiting the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) and criticizing the Azerbaijani leadership.
Azerbaijani prosecutors launched a criminal case into “repeated public anti-state calls” and “illegal crossing of Azerbaijan’s state border,” punishable with a prison term of five to eight years.
The extradition and persecution against Lapshin was widely slammed by international community as a gross violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of speech and movement.
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