Global InformationHuman rights in Azerbaijan information
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International organizations have frequently alleged that Azerbaijan has violated human rights standards established in international law.
Human Rights Watch issued a 2013 report accusing Azerbaijan of imprisoning and harassing political activists and human rights defenders.[1][2][3] In 2019, Human Rights Watch called the situation of human rights in Azerbaijan "appalling",[4] citing "rigid control" by the government, "severely curtailing freedoms of association, expression, and assembly", as well as "torture and ill-treatment" of journalists, lawyers, and opposition activists.[5] According to Reporters without Borders, Azerbaijan ranks 167 of 180 countries on the Press Freedom Index.[6] A 2020 report by the U.S. State Department accused Azerbaijan of a wide variety of human rights abuses, including "unlawful or arbitrary killing", "heavy restrictions on free expression, the press, and the internet", and "the worst forms of child labor".[7] A 2022 human rights review of Azerbaijan by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination found that during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabagh Conflict, the Azerbaijani military committed "severe and grave human rights violations ... against prisoners of war and other protected persons of Armenian ethnic or national origin, including extrajudicial killings, torture and other ill-treatment and arbitrary detention as well as the destruction of houses, schools, and other civilian facilities".[8]
The Constitution of Azerbaijan contains 48 Articles regarding principal human and civil rights. Section 3 of the Constitution establishes the major rights and freedoms of citizens of Azerbaijan, including human rights, property rights, equality rights, intellectual property rights, civil rights, the rights of the accused, the right to strike, social security, the right to vote and freedom of speech, conscience and thought.
On 28 December 2001, the National Assembly of the Republic of Azerbaijan adopted the Constitutional Law on the Commissioner for Human Rights (Ombudsman) of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and on 5 March 2002, the President signed a Decree on the application of this Law thus creation and functioning of the legal framework for the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Republic of Azerbaijan.[9]
- ^ "TIGHTENING THE SCREWS. Azerbaijan's Crackdown on Civil Society and Dissent 2013" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 13 March 2017. Retrieved 4 December 2016.
- ^ Human Rights Watch (October 2016). "HARASSED, IMPRISONED, EXILED Azerbaijan's Continuing Crackdown on Government Critics, Lawyers, and Civil Society" (PDF). hrw.org. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
- ^ "Azerbaijan: Ailing Rights Defenders Convicted in Political Trial". Human Rights Watch. 13 August 2015. Retrieved 20 September 2021.
- ^ "Azerbaijan: Events of 2018". English. 18 December 2018 – via Human Rights Watch.
- ^ "Azerbaijan: Events of 2019". Report 2020: Rights Trends in Azerbaijan. 10 December 2019.
- ^ "Azerbaijan | RSF". rsf.org.
- ^ "2020 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Azerbaijan". Retrieved 26 June 2021.
- ^ "Concluding observations on the combined tenth to twelfth reports of Azerbaijan" (PDF). UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. 30 August 2022. Retrieved 2 October 2022.
- ^ "Legal basis of the Commissione's activity". Archived from the original on 18 April 2019. Retrieved 15 February 2019.