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BAKU. August 14, 2009. The latest reports from Azerbaijan indicate that the government is expanding the investigation of pro-democracy activists, Adnan Hajizada and Emin Milli, beyond the human population. Several donkeys have been detained and interrogated and are expected to testify against Hajizada and Milli in the upcoming trial. Our correspondent was able to obtain a confidential photo of one such donkey arrest, shown above. The highly placed sourced in the Ministry of Very Deep Interior, who released the photo, asked to remain anonymous.

Rights groups and independent journalists suggest the latest development was caused by the fear of government prosecutors that the human witnesses they prepared to support their charges against the two youth bloggers do not look credible, including the alleged “victims” supposedly beaten by Hajizada and Milli.

The government spokesperson from the All-National Department of Sports, Fireworks, Concerts and Cattle Affairs denied these allegations and told that the donkeys were detained as high-value special knowledge witnesses. He emphasized: “Our government would never treat donkeys any different from human witnesses. Everyone is equal before our laws. That is our national policy. Donkeys are highly respected and have nothing to fear in Azerbaijan!” Asked why the trial and all preliminary hearings are closed to the public while the official charges are hooliganism, the spokesperson responded: “The donkeys will reveal the truth and final answer to this question. It is a very sensitive and serious matter, and our government does its best to protect our public from harmful information.”

Adnan Hajizada and Emin Milli were assaulted and beaten by two individuals in Baku on July 8, 2009. However, the authorities arrested Hajizada and Milli, instead of their attackers, charged them with hooliganism and jailed them pending the final trial, where the arrested youth activists can get up to 5 years in prison. Some reports indicate that their satiric video of “Press-conference by donkey”, posted online in response to the official statistics revealing hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on importing about a dozen donkeys into Azerbaijan, might have triggered their prosecution by the government.

(Soruces: donkey.az, i-a-i-a.info, qodux.com)

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