BAKU (Reuters) – Azerbaijani human rights activist Bakhtiyar Hajiyev was sentenced by a Baku court to 10 years in prison on Monday on an array of corruption and other charges that he denied, his lawyer told Reuters.
“We are dissatisfied with the court’s decision and will file an appeal,” lawyer Elchin Sadigov said after the verdict from the Baku Court of Grave Crimes.
Hajiyev was arrested in December 2022 on charges of hooliganism and contempt of court. The following June, prosecutors further accused him of financial violations including grant embezzlement, illegal entrepreneurship, money laundering, smuggling, using forged documents, and tax evasion.
Hajiyev rejected all the charges, describing them as politically motivated retaliation for his criticism of the government. Human rights groups have called him a political prisoner.
Azerbaijan, an oil-producing country that hosted the U.N. climate summit last November, has angrily rejected Western criticism of its human rights record, describing it as unacceptable interference.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Azerbaijani authorities last month to release detained human rights advocates, government critics and journalists, expressing deep concern about what he called an “increasing crackdown on civil society and media”.
(Reporting by Nailia Bagirova, Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
