Azerbaijan in the Council of Europe
Azerbaijan has been a member of the
Accession
European Court of Human Rights
As of 2021[update], Azerbaijan has the lowest rate of compliance of any Council of Europe member state with implementing leading judgements of the European Court of Human Rights from the last 10 years. Leading judgements are a subset of cases involving serious or systemic human rights violations and only 4% of such cases against Azerbaijan led to a rectification of the underlying human rights violation. Overall 47 leading ECtHR judgments against Azerbaijan have not been implemented.[8][9]
Leading ECtHR cases concerning Azerbaijan (incomplete list)
- Farhad Aliyev v. Azerbaijan (2010–2015) a group of cases concerning the extrajudicial detention, or detention with a reasonable suspicion of criminal offense, of several Azerbaijani citizens including former government minister Farhad Aliyev.[10]
- Committee of Ministers launched its first infringement procedure under ECHR Article 46(4). Shortly afterward, Mammadov was released but not exonerated.[11][12] The Council of Europe ended the infringement proceedings in September 2020 following the Supreme Court of Azerbaijan acquitting Mammadov.[13]
- Mammadli v. Azerbaijan (2018) — Violations of Article 5 and Article 18 due to the abuse of criminal law to target twelve human rights activists, including Anar Mammadli, arrested by Azerbaijan between 2013 and 2016.[14]
- banning certain books from import.[15]
- Makuchyan and Minasyan v. Azerbaijan and Hungary (2020) — Azerbaijan violated Article 14 and Article 2 over pardon for Ramil Safarov, convicted of an ethnically charged murder of an Armenian.[16]
- Mirgadirov v. Azerbaijan (2020) — wrongful detention of journalist Rauf Mirgadirov[17]
Other ECtHR cases concerning Azerbaijan (incomplete list)
- Badalyan v. Azerbaijan — an Armenian citizen who crossed the border and was imprisoned by Azerbaijan for 22 months and alleged mistreatment in custody. In 2021, the ECtHR ruled that Azerbaijan had violated Article 3 and Article 5.[18]
- A. v. Azerbaijan (17184/18) and 24 other applications concern arbitrary arrest, ill-treatment, and forced medical examinations of LGBT people in Baku following 2017 police raids. These cases are being considered together pending a hearing at the ECtHR.[19][20]
Interstate cases
In late 2020, both Armenia and Azerbaijan filed cases against each other related to the
Committee for the Prevention of Torture
In 2018, the Council of Europe's Committee for the Prevention of Torture reported that torture and ill-treatment are "widespread and systematic" by Azerbaijan's law enforcement agencies.[22] Physical and psychological violence are used to extract confessions, punish people for activism or being members of marginalized groups such as LGBT community or minority religions. The Azerbaijani government disagreed with these findings.[22]
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
In the first few years of Azerbaijani membership in the Council of Europe, PACE passed multiple resolutions condemning Azerbaijan for holding political prisoners. Aliyev released hundreds. In 2001, Swiss politician Andreas Gross became the Council of Europe rapporteur for Azerbaijan. In 2006 he decided to challenge the credentials of Azerbaijan's PACE delegation on the grounds of vote-rigging and other violations of Council of Europe standards. By 100 votes to 67, PACE declined to sanction Azerbaijan.[2]
According to a 2012 report from the European Stability Initiative, Azerbaijan's corrupt "caviar diplomacy" began shortly after it joined the Council of Europe in 2001 and accelerated after the younger Aliyev became president in 2003. PACE members were given expensive gifts (including silk carpets, gold, caviar, and money) and invited on trips to Baku, although not all voted in favor of Azerbaijan for corrupt reasons.[23] In 2013, a critical report on political prisoners in Azerbaijan by German representative Christoph Strässer was voted down by 125 votes to 79 with 20 abstentions.[24] Italian PACE representative Luca Volontè was paid to derail the report. Italian prosecutors investigated Volontè, and in 2021 he was sentenced to four years in prison for accepting €2 million ($2.43 million) in bribes from two Azerbaijani politicians. In 2014, Azerbaijan launched a crackdown on civil society.[25]
In 2018, 13 members of the
In 2020 PACE passed a resolution urging Azerbaijan to release its political prisoners.[28]
Reputational cost of membership
Austrian political scientist Gerald Knaus charges that through violating human rights and maintaining its position in the Council of Europe, Azerbaijan "has managed to steal the soul of Europe’s most important human rights institution".[2] Knaus states that the Council of Europe intended that membership would change Azerbaijan's human rights and democracy record, but instead Azerbaijan "captured" the Council of Europe, both by bribery of PACE members as well as continuing its membership in the organization while holding political prisoners and manipulated elections.[2]
International law scholars Kanstantsin Dzehtsiarou and Donal K Coffey cite Azerbaijan as one of the Council of Europe member states that show "persistent and clear disregard of the values and aims of the CoE".[27] Dzehtsiarou and Coffey conclude that ECtHR judgements are not effective in bringing about structural change if there is no political will to implement them in the member state. The fact that Azerbaijan remains a full member of the Council of Europe while ignoring ECtHR judgements and holding political prisoners can erode the credibility of the institution, one argument for sanctioning or expelling Azerbaijan.[27]
See also
References
- ^ a b c d "Caucasus: Armenia And Azerbaijan Join Council Of Europe". RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ a b c d e f g Knaus, Gerald (2015). "Europe and Azerbaijan: The End of Shame". Journal of Democracy. 26 (3): 5–18.
- ^ "Azerbaijan: Freedom in the World 2020 Country Report". Freedom House. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ Kucera, Joshua (26 February 2020). "Azerbaijan's elections: What went wrong?". Eurasianet. Retrieved 15 October 2021.
- ISSN 2057-3170.
- .
- ^ "Country Map". European Implementation Network. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
- ^ "Azerbaijan". European Implementation Network. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ https://hudoc.exec.coe.int/eng#{%22EXECDocumentTypeCollection%22:[%22CEC%22],%22EXECLanguage%22:[%22ENG%22],%22EXECState%22:[%22AZE%22],%22EXECIsClosed%22:[%22False%22],%22EXECType%22:[%22L%22]} Pending leading judgements against Azerbaijan, Hudoc
- ^ Farhad Aliyev v. Azerbaijan
- ^ "Azerbaijan Threatened With Expulsion from Council of Europe | Eurasianet". eurasianet.org. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- .
- ^ "Implementing ECHR judgments: Council of Europe closes infringement procedure against Azerbaijan". www.coe.int. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ Mammadli v. Azerbaijan 19/04/2018
- ^ "ECtHR: Jehovah's Witnesses rights violated by Azerbaijan". EU Law Live. 24 February 2020. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ISSN 2666-3228.
- ^ Mirgadirov v. Azerbaijan 17/09/2020
- ^ "Armenian-Azeri Dispute Shifts to European Court". Institute for War and Peace Reporting. 17 June 2011. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ Nechepurenko, Ivan (29 September 2017). "Azerbaijan Detains Dozens of Gay and Transgender People". The New York Times. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ A. v. Azerbaijan at HUDOC
- ^ Ghazanchyan, Siranush (12 May 2021). "ECtHR Grand Chamber to examine two inter-state cases lodged by Armenia and Azerbaijan". Public Radio of Armenia. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ a b Remezaite, Ramute; Aliyeva, Ulkar. "Council of Europe's old pandemic: 'endemic' ill-treatment and torture in custody in Azerbaijan". European Implementation Network. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ REPORT of the Independent Investigation Body on the allegations of corruption within the Parliamentary Assembly, 15 April 2018, pp. 2–3
- ^ "Fresh claims of Azerbaijan vote-rigging at European human rights body". the Guardian. 20 April 2017. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ Ljubas, Zdravko. "Italian Court Sentences Former Council of Europe MP for Bribery". www.occrp.org. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ Chase-Lubitz, Jesse. "Council of Europe Body Expels 13 in Azerbaijan Bribe Case". www.occrp.org. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ ISSN 0020-5893.
- ^ "Azerbaijan has a political prisoners 'problem', says PACE, urging review of reported cases and wider reform". Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. 30 January 2020. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
Further reading
- Hajiyev, Khanlar (2016). "Azerbaijan: The directions of influence of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights in Azerbaijan". The Impact of the ECHR on Democratic Change in Central and Eastern Europe: Judicial Perspectives. Cambridge University Press. pp. 57–79. ISBN 978-1-107-13502-4.
- Komanovics, Adrienne (2018). "Infringement proceedings against Azerbaijan: judicialisation of the execution of the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights". Anuario da Facultade de Dereito da Universidade da Coruña (22): 138–156. ISSN 1138-039X.