Anar Mammadli
Azerbaijani human rights defender (HRD) Anar Mammadli has been awarded the prestigious Václav Havel Human Rights Prize, made by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in honour of an outstanding contribution to civil society in the defence of human rights. Imprisoned on trumped-up charges by the authorities, Mammadli could not accept the award himself, and so his father, Asaf Mammadov, accepted on his son's behalf.
Although the movement for human rights has been weakened in our country, there is no other option but to continue on this path.
Anar Mammadli is the chairperson of the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre (EMDS), an organization that has been conducting independent election monitoring in Azerbaijan since 2001. He has faced systemic persecution for his work, including detention. In 2014, Anar Mammadli received the Václav Havel Human Rights Prize from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) for his outstanding contributions to civil society in the defense of human rights. Due to his imprisonment at the time, Anar Mammadli could not personally accept the award.
The space for human rights defenders (HRDs) and NGOs has been steadily shrinking in Azerbaijan. A number of legislative amendments have been adopted in recent years that restrict the work of HRDs and put their activities under strict governmental control. The roundup of the most prominent HRDs and their subsequent trials and imprisonment indicate that Azerbaijan is well on the road towards authoritarianism, seemingly adopting a Russian-style contempt of civil society.
