Azerbaijan does not fulfill obligations to the Council of Europe

The Monitoring Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) called the Azerbaijani authorities to intensify work on implementation of legislation on the functioning of democratic institutions. The call came after the approval at the committee meeting in Paris of report of the co-rapporteurs on Azerbaijan Pedro Agramunt and Joseph Grekh on implementation by the country commitments to the Council of Europe and the relevant recommendations, reports “Turan”. At the same time, the Committee recognized the expedient maintaining of the Azerbaijan under the monitoring procedure.

The report is noted that since joining the Council of Europe, Azerbaijan has made progress in various fields on creating the legal framework for functioning of democratic institutions. At the same time, “limiting applying or violation of some laws is a growing concern for ensuring of the rule of law and respect for human rights”. Problems with independence of the judiciary are still kept.

The authors of the report are named as “alarming” status of certain fundamental freedoms – expression of opinion, conscience, association and assembly.

Information from human rights activists on alleged arrests of journalists and activists on the so-called false charges are cause of anxiety. Restrictive implementation of freedom combined with unfair trials leads to systematic arrests of people who may be considered prisoners of conscience.

Recently adopted amendments to the legislation to increase penalties for organizers and participants of the “unauthorized” demonstrations are also source of concern of the Monitoring Committee of the PACE.

The co-rapporteurs also note the availability of information about alleged cases of torture during pretrial detention in police stations in process of the investigation and during serve a sentence.

In addition, despite the progress reached in developing the legislative framework to combat corruption and organized crime, the main problem is the necessity for “effective application of this legislation”.

Among the recommendations are presented the revision of cases against the arrested journalists and activists, with using all available legal tools for their release.

It is also recommended the release on humanitarian grounds of alleged political prisoners whose state of health is a concern. In general it is recommended a full realization of the previous PACE resolutions relating to alleged political prisoners in Azerbaijan.

Besides, PACE recommends improvement of the electoral system in Azerbaijan on the basis of proposals of the ODIHR of the OSCE and the Venice Commission, the removal of obstacles to registration of NGOs, simplification of registration process of international NGOs, ensuring of the conditions to create an opposition faction in parliament, etc.

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