UPDATE: 5 June 2018, 7:00 pm, Baku
According to his lawyer, Emin Aslanov has been sentenced to 30 days detention for failing to obey a police officer’s orders.
UPDATE: 5 June 2018, 5:00 pm, Baku
Emin Aslanov is being held at the Office for Combating Organized Crime, his lawyer Elchin Sadigov has been told. Sadigov has not been allowed to meet with his client.
Earlier, investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova
identified
the car in which Aslanov was abducted as belonging to Mehman Teymurov, an
officer
with the same anti-organized-crime unit.
About 130 human rights defenders, journalists, and bloggers have signed an appeal in Aslanov’s defense.
“We know Emin Aslanov as a professional lawyer and one of the most dignified young persons in this country,” the appeal reads. “We can say with utter confidence that he has not committed any crime. This arrest is politically motivated because of his professional and public activities.”
******
Friends and relatives have been unable to ascertain lawyer Emin Aslanov’s whereabouts after he was detained by three unidentified people in civilian clothes.
At 5:00 pm in Baku on 4 June, Emin Aslanov was detained by three unidentified people in civilian clothes in front of the Park Bulvar mall on the Caspian shore. The three people put Aslanov in a Mercedes with license plate number 90 XG 017 and drove off.
About 30 minutes later, friends and family reported the incident to the Ministry of Internal Affairs’ 102 hotline, but according to Anar Mammadli, chairman of the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Center, they have been unable to ascertain Aslanov’s whereabouts.
“There has been no response to our call to the 102 hotline over two hours ago,” Mammadli told Meydan TV last night. “We have learned that police station #39 is investigating the matter. Then we visited police stations # 9 and #22, the Baku City Police Department, and the Office for Combating Organized Crime. Unfortunately, despite our efforts, we haven’t gotten any information as to where he was taken or kidnapped. Emin Aslanov’s fiancee has already filed a petition at police station #39 in the Sabail district.”
After receiving his Master’s degree from Syracuse University in the US, Aslanov returned to Azerbaijan four days ago. He has worked as a lawyer for a number of organizations, including preparing complaints to be heard at the European Court of Human Rights.
Aslanov’s relatives have retained the services of human rights lawyer Elchin Sadigov.
