Attacks on the Press in 2008: Azerbaijan
The Georgia-Russia crisis in August diverted international attention from another strategically important Caucasus country–oil-rich Azerbaijan. The authoritarian president, Ilham Aliyev, gained a new term in a flawed October 15 vote. Aliyev, who effectively inherited the presidency from his father, Heydar, in 2003, defeated six virtual unknowns after top opposition parties boycotted the October vote to…
With friends like this … Aliyev gets Azerbaijani ‘award’
Life is full of surprises. In Eurasia, authoritarian leaders and their entourages like to pull them out around the holidays. What made my eyes open wide this season was a news report from Azerbaijan, dated December 29. The Baku-based Trend news agency said President Ilham Aliyev had been given the “Journalists’ Friend Award” by the…
In Bangladesh, a prominent journalist is taken in military raid
New York, May 11, 2007—Plainclothes officers raided the Dhaka home of prominent journalist and human rights advocate Tasneem Khalil early this morning in an action that the Committee to Protect Journalists called “an indication of the fragile state of press freedom in Bangladesh.” Four men identifying themselves as a “joint task force” came to Khalil’s…