Authorities ban rights defender Gyulyalyev to leave Azerbaijan

The court has allowed Ogtai Gyulyalyev, the head of the Public Alliance "Azerbaijan Without Political Prisoners", to leave the country, but today officials refused to give him a passport, saying that the ban on his travels abroad is still in force, Ogtai said himself.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on October 22 law enforcers told Gyulyalyev that the case about appeals to riots initiated against him in 2012 was closed, and the ban on his travel abroad was lifted.

"Today, I turned to the ASAN centre in the Khatain District of Baku asking to give me a foreign passport, but I was denied under the pretext that the ban on my travelling abroad is still in force," said Gyulyalyev.

According to his story, he presented to an ASAN employee the court judgement on lifting the travel ban, but it did not help. "I was told that the judgement is no rule for them, and they are guided by the data of their electronic system," said the activist.

Mr Gyulyalyev has treated the preservation of the ban on his travels abroad as a means of political pressure on him.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.