This month, a court in Azerbaijan convicted the prominent opposition leader Tofig Yagublu on fabricated forgery and fraud charges, sentencing him to nine years in prison. Yagublu’s prosecution and imprisonment is part of the Azerbaijani government’s relentless efforts to silence dissenting voices in the country.
Yagublu, 64, is a former journalist and a senior member of the National Council of Democratic Forces, a coalition of opposition parties and pro-democracy activists.
Following Yagublu’s arrest in December 2023, police searched his home and claim to have found €5,000 (about US$5,427), 2,500 Azerbaijani manat (about US$1,470), and an unspecified amount in US dollars. The authorities allege that Yagublu was involved in a scheme to supply fake documents to a third party to support an asylum application. Yagublu and his family deny having had the money in their possession and believe the police planted it during their search.
This is not Yagublu’s first time in prison. For years, the authorities have targeted him with politically motivated charges. He spent three years behind bars on false incitement charges. Following his release in 2016, he was arrested again in October 2019 after participating in an unsanctioned rally. In 2021 he was subjected to ill-treatment in custody in retaliation for his activism.
Yagublu is among dozens of opposition figures, journalists, rights defenders, scholars, and activists against whom the authorities have brought a wave of politically motivated arrests.
Since December 2024, the courts have delivered lengthy prison sentences against at least eight journalists and activists, including Aziz Orucov, director of Kanal 13, and Teymur Karimov, director of Kanal 11; labor rights activists Mohyaddin Orucov and Afiaddin Mammadov; political activists Bakhtiyar Hajiyev and Rail Abbasov; human rights lawyer Ilhamiz Guliyev; and human rights defender Elshan Karimov. The charges range from illegal construction, extortion, drug trafficking, and hooliganism to financial crimes, including fraud.
The Azerbaijani government’s pattern of using the criminal justice system to retaliate against its critics is well documented, including by the European Court of Human Rights. The authorities should immediately free Yagublu and all other unjustly imprisoned journalists and activists and allow them to operate without undue government interference.
