As the West has turned its attention to the Islamic
State and the Ukraine crisis, the government of President Ilham Aliyev
has expanded its crackdown on dissenting voices in Azerbaijan with
harassment, threats, beatings, and arrests. Even American citizens and
international NGOs have bet caught up in the widening net of repression.
These actions demand a response.
For years, Belarus’s leader
Alexander Lukashenka has been called Europe’s last dictator, although
Vladimir Putin is giving Lukashenka a run for his money, amidst the
worst crackdown on human rights in Russia in decades. And now we might
also add another leader in the region to the list: President Ilham
Aliyev of Azerbaijan.
After an accelerating series of arrests, Aliyev’s government now holds nearly 100 political prisoners,
roughly double the number in Belarus and Russia combined. Beyond the
raw numbers, Azerbaijan’s authorities are also getting more thuggish in
their handling of critics, journalists, and opposition figures—as well
as Westerners.
Statements of concern and criticism from Western and international
officials and organizations have fallen on deaf ears in Baku. Even
President Obama’s recent criticism
of Azerbaijan’s treatment of NGOs made no impact. To the contrary,
there are now credible reports that the Azerbaijani authorities plan to
arrest investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova when she returns to
Baku from a trip abroad. The best way to try to reverse this disturbing
trend is to impose penalties on the Aliyev regime for its outrageous
treatment of its own people.
Among the most egregious abuses are the July 30 arrests
of civil society activists Leyla and Arif Yunus, accused of spying for
Armenian secret services—implausible charges linked to the decades-old
dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh. On August 20, journalist Ilgar Nasibov
was savagely beaten
into a state of unconsciousness while he was in the office of a rights
organization in the Naxcivan region. Several leading opposition
figures—including Ilgar Mamedov of the opposition movement REAL and
Tofig Yakublu of Musavat—languish in prison on unsubstantiated charges.
American citizens and organizations are not immune from Azerbaijan’s
heavy-handed intolerance of dissenting voices. Said Nuri, an American
citizen of Azerbaijani origin, was recently blocked for nearly a week
from leaving Baku, after visiting his ailing father. The local offices
of several American and international non-governmental organizations
have been raided and/or their bank accounts frozen, and their employees
harassed including IREX, the National Democratic Institute, Transparency
International, and Oxfam. Several grantees of the National Endowment
for Democracy have been arrested, and numerous others have had their
accounts frozen.
Azerbaijan’s smear campaign has included U.S. officials, too.
Recently departed U.S. Ambassador Richard Morningstar was subjected to
various personal attacks by Azerbaijani government representatives,
including the Chief of the Presidential Administration, Ramiz Mehdiyev.
Senate staffers during a visit to Baku earlier this year were called
“dogs” by a prosecutor and “spies” by a parliamentarian after meeting
with Khadija Ismayilova.
Any individual or organization that criticizes Aliyev or promotes
democracy is viewed as hostile. Mehdiyev has characterized independent
media as “anti-Azerbaijani forces” financed from abroad.
The Council of Europe’s human rights chief, Nils Muiznieks, slammed
the Azerbaijani government earlier this month for the “totally
unacceptable” human rights situation, which, he said,
“flies in the face of the human rights obligations undertaken by
Azerbaijan” as a member of the Council. In August, several UN human
rights envoys said they were “appalled” by the growing number of abuses
and arrests of rights activists “on the basis of trumped-up charges.”
The “criminalization of rights activists must stop,” they declared, calling for the release of the Yunuses and others.
For years, Azerbaijan’s oil and gas reserves insulated the country
from exposure for its abysmal human rights record. The West’s attention
lately has been focused on the Russia-Ukraine crisis and the challenge
of the Islamic State, giving the Aliyev regime a sense that it can get
away with its crackdown. To be safe, at last month’s NATO summit it offered
to take part in investment and reconstruction projects in Afghanistan,
betting that contributions to the allied effort would buy it a pass on
its internal situation. Azerbaijan has also thrown around lots of the
money it has earned from energy exports to buy influence and friends in the West.
Azerbaijani authorities often argue that they live in a tough
neighborhood—sandwiched between Russia and Iran and with an unresolved
conflict with Armenia—and that this should excuse them for their
behavior. Geopolitics, however, shouldn’t shield Azerbaijan from
criticism for treating its citizens and Western organizations as
criminals.
It’s time, therefore, for the United States to apply a law modeled on
the 2012 Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law and Accountability Act to
authorities in Baku. A number of Azerbaijani activists have called for
such measures. Given the reported assets the Aliyev family and its
circle hold overseas, freezing their assets and denying them access and
travel to the West might just do the trick. The State Department should
also issue a travel warning to American citizens alerting them of the
surveillance, harassment, and possible detention they might face in
Azerbaijan.
At a time when Vladimir Putin is continuing Russia’s aggression
against Ukraine, some will argue that, for geopolitical reasons, this is
not the time for the United States to get tough on Azerbaijan. There is
never a good time to take such steps, but the situation inside
Azerbaijan demands a response now. Further Western expressions of
“concern” or characterizations of the situation as “unacceptable” would
sound increasingly hollow. The Aliyev regime must understand that there
are consequences for its abuses.
David J. Kramer and Richard Kauzlarich
Published on October 2, 2014
