Imran Aliyev, founder of Meclis.info, a website that publishes news and analysis about Azerbaijan’s parliament, has been detained since April 2024 on currency smuggling charges related to alleged receipt of Western donor funding.
Aliyev is one of at least 25 journalists and media workers jailed between late 2023 and August 2025, in a major crackdown on the independent press and civil society in Azerbaijan. Most of the journalists have been arrested on similar funding accusations amid a decline in relations between Azerbaijan and the West.
Officers from Azerbaijan’s State Border Service detained Aliyev at Baku International Airport on April 18, 2024.
Earlier that day, a pro-government news website published an article identifying Aliyev as a “new name” in authorities’ investigations into a Western-controlled “network” of media outlets and NGOs paid to carry out “anti-national goals.” The article referred to criminal cases against independent outlets Abzas Media and Toplum TV, 10 of whose journalists were arrested and charged with currency smuggling in relation to their funding.
In a video filmed from Baku airport, Aliyev said that he tried to leave Azerbaijan for his safety after reading the article but was detained. He rejected the allegations against him as “fabricated.”
The following day, Baku’s Khatai District Court ordered that Aliyev be held in pretrial detention on currency smuggling charges.
Responding to a question about the journalist in late April, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, no relation, said at a news conference that media representatives "who illegally receive funding from abroad" had been arrested within the framework of the law.
Azerbaijani law bans foreign funding of the media, and requires government approval for foreign grants to civil society, which is rarely given. Authorities accuse Meclis.info and other outlets of failing to obtain this approval. Laywers argue that such an omission is punishable under by fines and not criminal sanctions.
Elgiz Gahraman, a data analyst at Meclis.info, told CPJ that he believes authorities targeted Aliyev because Meclis.info highlighted parliamentarians’ errors and awkward statements.
In court, Aliyev alleged that police beat and electrocuted him during detention. News reports quoted his relatives as saying that he had bruises under his eyes and unspecified injuries on his body. A person familiar with the case, who spoke to CPJ on condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisal, said police forced Aliyev to sign a document and to waive his right to a lawyer, and that police beat Aliyev again in retaliation for his allegations of mistreatment. Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs denied the allegations.
In early March 2025, it was reported that authorities had filed seven new economic crime charges against Aliyev, including tax evasion and money laundering, and had also charged Gahraman with the same crimes. If convicted under the new charges, the journalists face up to 12 years in prison.
In late May, the trial of Aliyev, Gahraman, and Tamella Musayeva, an accountant for Meclis.info, got underway in Baku.
As of August 2025, Aliyev remains in pretrial custody. Gahraman, who is free on bail pending a verdict, told CPJ that Aliyev is in good health, but that he has lost 15 kilograms (33 pounds) in detention.
CPJ emailed the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Office of the Prosecutor General, and the office of the President of Azerbaijan for comment in August 2025, but did not receive any replies.