State-controlled TV channels attack human rights defender

At prime time on Sunday evening, 12 June, Leila Yunus, director of the Institute of Peace and Democracy, was verbally abused on several Azerbaijani TV channels at once for her human rights activities, in particular for composing lists of political prisoners and sending them to Malcolm Bruce, rapporteur on political prisoners for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, says the press service of the Institute of Peace and Democracy.

"Remarkably, apart from accusations of betraying the homeland's interests and receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars for that, which have already become commonplace, the ATB channel indicated the complete address at which Leila Yunus and her family actually live and directly called for physical violence," says the release received by Caucasian Knot.

The journalists could obtain the human rights defender's complete address from officers of the special division for the combating of terrorism at the National Security Ministry of Azerbaijan (Lieutenant Colonel Namik Abdullayev and Captain Alish Aliyev), because they were the only people whom Leila Yunus had given the address were she actually lives at a meeting on 4 April 2005. Her registered residence is to her parents' home.

"This act of television journalists completely repeats an act committed with respect to Eldar Zeinalov, director of the Human Rights Centre, in April 2003 (an electoral year) when his home address was given in a broadcast which coincides with his office address. In just a few days, "protest actions of discontent people" began, with egg-slinging and windows broken in the Human Rights Centre, as well as the Institute of Peace and Democracy," the release notes.

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