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BAKU. January 7, 2009: Ramil Usubov, the minister of Internal Affairs of Azerbaijan forwarded legal charges (slander) against Leyla Yunus, a well-known human rights activist of Azerbaijan.  The chief policeman of Azerbaijan was angered by the interview given by Leyla Yunus to day.az information website on December 3, 2009.  In  that interview Leyla Yunus talked about the wide-spread use of torture by the police and criminal investigation divisions of Azerbaijan, about the human trafficking and a police support for the criminals, who are stealing underage girls in different regions of Azerbaijan in order to sell them abroad.  Namely, Leyla Yunus talked about the famous case of kidnapping of two sisters - 14 year old Naila Mejidova and 7 year old Reyhan Mejidova in Davachi region on August 6, 2007.  The Azeri human rights activist claimed that the court deliberately refused to consider the testimonies of the parents of the kidnapped girls about the involvement of the deputy police chief of Devechi region Mammadmusa Husseinov and the testimony of the local villager, who was arrested by the police and who claimed that he carried out the kidnapping operation at the orders of the police officers.  Below is the full text of the interview with Leyla Yunus: 

03 December 2008 [09:36] – Day.Az quoting interview with Leila Yunus, Director of the Institute of Peace and Democracy.

- Mrs. Leila Yunus, as it appears you have been repeatedly raising the issue of objectivity of fairness of Azeri courts and judges. For example, how fair was the famous trial over the kidnapping of Mejidova sisters – 14 years old Naila and 7 years old Reyhan on August 6, 2007 in the village Dagbilidjhi of Davachi region?

-Since 2006 the Institute of Peace and Democracy has been monitoring trials in Azerbaijan. Based on the monitoring results the analysis of court’s investigation and decisions compliance with the legislation of the Republic and the international law, in particular, the European Convention on Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms is published in the mass-media of the Republic.

Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of courts in Azerbaijan starting from the courts of first instance and finishing by the court of appeal and Supreme Court issue illegal and unwarranted decisions. The citizens are practically unprotected from the arbitrariness of judges.

In 2006 our Institute publicly listed over 60 names of the judges with the purpose of displaying the names of the judges who are impairing the law and issuing unlawful and unwarranted court decisions. In January 2007 we sent striped cloaks to three court judges who are specializing in grave crimes (Mansur Ibaev, Tofik Pashaev and Azer Orujiev) as a symbol of "acknowledgement of their merit". Unfortunately, giving a striped cloak to Ahmed Guliev - the court judge working on grave crimes and in charge of the case about hijacking Medjidov’s sisters from Dagbiliji village of Diavachi region – is even too soft. Of course, one should always believe that the law will be respected and that we will wait for the completion of the judicial process.

However, today after 4 months of the case revision in the court, several major violations of the law can be pointed out, which are being repeated by the judge Ahmed Guliyev and which are typical for our judges.

1. The denial of the reports of the accused persons about the use of tortures during the investigation. Accused Tavakkul Ismailov clearly stated during the trial that he was tortured and he even demonstrated the traces of torture on his feet. However, the judge ignored this fact. Moreover, the judge A. Guliyev acted the same way, just like his colleague Mansur Ibayev, who ignored the fact of torture of accused Sardar Jalaloglu (Mamedov) and other leaders of opposition, whose cases were investigated in the court for grave crimes in 2004.

In January 2007 the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has made a decision, which reconfirmed the fact of applying the torture with reference to Sardar Mamedov and not investigating further his complaint about the torture. The Ministerial Committee of the Council of Europe that is overseeing the execution of the decisions of the European court, pointed out the necessity of an in-depth investigation of the fact of tortures used towards Sardar Mamedov and the determination of the people liable for this incident and holding them responsible for it. Afterwards Mansur Ibayev had suddenly retired.

And the judge Ahmed Guliyev has not learned the lesson. The ignorance of the law by these judges objectively increase the number of European Court’s judgments held against Azerbaijan.

2. The accused Tavakkul Ismaylov had testified in the court that already on the fourth da y after his arrest, he submitted a written statement to the investigations judge, in which he admitted that he participated in the kidnapping of Mejidov’s sisters, whom he abducted and handed over following the instructions of Mamedmusa Huseynov - the deputy chief of police of Davachi region.

Zakir Saatov, the investigator from the Office of Attorney General on special cases who had led this case, had not been invited by the judge to the court either despite the requests submitted by the lawyers of the victims Mehman Aliyev and the lawyer of the accused Gachay Mammadov. Despite the repeated requests made by the lawyers of the victims and the defendants, neither Zakir Saatov nor Mamedmusa Husseinov have been invited to the court by the judge Ahmad Guliyev during 4 months period.

In other words, the judge has no intent or interest (at least up to the present day) to conduct an objective judicial investigation and uncover the truth, which is also very typical for our judicial system.

3. During the trial, the accused confessed in committing another violent crime on May 17, 2005 -hijacking 17 years old Dilafruz Dashtieva, another resident of Dagbilidji village. Accused testified that this girl was also transferred to senior officer at the Ministry of Internal Affairs - Mamedmusa Huseinov. However, the judge practically ignored this statement (!) shedding the light on uncovered crime. Moreover, according to Dilafruz Dashtieva’s mother, the police of Davachi region refused to accept her claims about her daughter’s disappearance.

Unfortunately, everything that was mentioned above is very typical for our courts and judges. The only distinguishing feature of this awful in all respects court process is an awkward at first sight bonding of the accused and defendants families. The residents of the village teamed up in their fair demand to the judge Ahmed Guliev to respect the law. Meanwhile, their lawyers are appealing to the judge (without any result so far) to bring in the court Mamedmusa Huseinov and the investigator from General Office of Public Prosecutor - Zakir Saatov.

- How do you explain that the judge Ahmad Guliyev refuses to bring before the court the deputy police chief of Davachi region Mamedmusa Husseinov and fails to hold liable Zakit Saatov from the Office of Attorney General, when according to the defendant’s words, he was tortured during the investigation process?

- As I mentioned earlier, the cases of ignoring the claims about the tortures and not holding responsible the investigators from the the Office of Attorney General, is very typical and is very common characteristic of the judges in Azerbaijan. During numerous lawsuits we have registered the claims from both plaintiffs and accused describing violation of the law by the investigators from the Office of Attorney General, but all the judges are ignoring any claims against the Office of Public Prosecutor.

I think the reason behind that is also because the Attorney General may initiate the removal of the judge from his position. The representative of the General Office of Public Prosecutor participates in the meetings of the Court Council on Legal Matters that reviews the claims regarding the punishment and the removal of judges from the court cases, who made the decisions against the interests of Prosecutor’s Office on the matters that are subject to criminal investigation and accusation by the State.

It is evident that the courts are in fact not capable of conducting fair trials and making warranted decisions in regards to tthe Office of Attorney General – the office of the court power.

Regarding the deputy police chief of Davachi region it can be said that listening to the claims of the accused about him, I recall the statement made by Haji Mammadov, the colonel from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, that his gang is only one tiny piece of a large criminal network that exists in the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Do you remember how the gang of Haji Mamedov was caught? For many years they have committed terrible, hard crimes and remained unpunished. Their crimes were not investigated even when witness Rena Nasibova turned to the Office of Attorney General and gave a written testimony about terrible crimes. A valuable witness was simply killed.

The gang was caught when they kidnapped the wife of very famous person. The conclusion that comes to mind – ordinary citizens of our country are completely unprotected from the criminals that hold the power. For the majority of citizens in Azerbaijan it is absolutely clear that they will not be able to defend their legal rights to property, rights to work, rights to health, which means that they cannot win from the executive authorities.

Nevertheless, in the soul of an ordinary Azeri there was a hope that some national values and notorious mentality still remain – that it is unacceptable to jeopardize the life of children, woman’s honor. The cases like this are destroying these illusions.

- But the National Program to fight the trafficking of people was adopted in Azerbaijan. The Ministry of Internal Affairs reports on uncovering the crimes in this area almost every week?

- Very correct observation. Numerous activities are carried out on a regular basis within the framework of this Program. Only this week on December 3rd, the Ministry of Internal Affairs conducted a meeting together with the representatives of NGOs, and on December 5th – charitable donations are being collected in Philharmonic Centre for the benefit of victims of trafficking. And beneath the buzz of all these events the senior officer from the Ministry of Internal Affairs paid US $200 for each of kidnapped girls to accused Ismailov

-How then can we put an end to these crimes?

-You know, sometimes in the mid-1990s at one of the international conferences I heard the speech of my colleague from Nigeria. She mentioned that the majority of their citizens fear the police. In the evening a Nigerian woman tries not to get in sight of the police and will cross over to the next street if she sees a policeman on the same street. At that time I sympathized with the colleague.

In 2001 in the USA, I heard a colleague from Mexico, who talked about the movement that was organized by the parents of the girls who were kidnapped by the traffickers. The Ministry of Internal Affairs in Mexico either failed to cope with the criminal network or patronized the criminals. Then I thought to myself - Azerbaijani policemen would never do something like this – I naively thought that our policemen in the first place are Azerbaijani men and are fathers themselves, so they will never make business on children.

Today I think how quickly we are reaching the countries in Africa and America. And I also would like that the judge Ahmad Guliyev and his family members could imagine the eyes – frightened eyes of 7-year-old Reyhan and 14-year-old Naila Mejidova.

Ilya Fainzilberg
Day.Az