Jailing of prominent human rights activists in Azerbaijan casts a shadow over Europe’s planned gas deals with the Aliyev regime

London, Prague — Azerbaijan’s authoritarian regime has been intensifying its crackdown on civil society with the recent jailing of two leading human rights defenders. The Aliyev regime has gained much of its political and financial clout by siphoning off proceedings from the country’s vast oil and gas reserves. These are the same reserves that the EU is now planning to make its next big source of gas, and the same government that the EU still considers a legitimate partner.

Azeri human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev used to be defending political prisoners. On Wednesday (April 22), a court in Baku sentenced him to seven and a half years behind bars after he had been charged with illegal entrepreneurship and tax evasion.

Prior to his arrest, Intigam has submitted more than 200 applications to the European Court of Human Rights over cases of election rigging, abuses of free speech, and the right to fair trial.

Just days earlier another prominent human rights activist, Rasul Jafarov, was sentenced to six and a half years in prison on similar charges. He started the Sports for Rights campaign targetting the 2015 European Games that will be opened in Baku, Azerbaijan, in less than two months. Rasul also organised the Sing for Democracy campaign during the 2012 Eurovision song contest in Baku.

These are only the latest cases in an ongoing relentless clampdown on dissent in Azerbaijan. The EU has cautiously come out against Rasul’s sentencing, but Azerbaijan’s terrible human rights record has not deterred Brussels from maintaining its close relations with the Aliyev regime.

In fact, in July, shortly after the conclusion of the games, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development is set to decide on a USD 500 million loan to the Russian oil company Lukoil for its share in Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz gas field. Bank officials have also spoken publicly about intentions to lend to the Euro-Caspian Mega Pipeline project as part of the EU’s Southern Gas Corridor megaproject. If realized, this pipeline, starting at the Shah Deniz gas field, would run from the Caspian Sea to southern Italy, helping lock Europe into further fossil fuel dependency until at least 2050.

Therefore, the recent imprisonment of Rasul and Intigam serves to highlight Europe’s strikingly inconsistent approach toward Azerbaijan’s oil dictatorship.

Shortly before his arrest in August, Rasul spoke about the role of fossil fuels extractions in entrenching Aliyev’s rule:

“Before the oil and gas incomes came to Azerbaijan we had more democracy and freedom. The main income from oil came in 2006 when the Baku-Tibilsi-Ceyhan pipeline started to operate. And from that time the situation started to deteriorate. We have problems with journalists, activists and religious believers being arrested- if you critise the government you can easily be interrogated and prosecuted under fabricated charges.”

Emma Hughes, from the London-based energy watchdog Platform, said: “European public banks should not be lending to the Euro-Caspian Mega Pipeline or the associated gas field when it is clear that fossil fuel projects such as these are enabling this repression. It is time for the EU to look very seriously at who they are doing business with here – they should be demanding the release of Azerbaijan’s political prisoners. Instead they are keeping business as usual with the regime at a time when human rights abuses are dramatically increasing.”

For more information please contact:

Emma Hughes
emma@platformlondon.org
+44 780 114 01 92

Note to editors:

For more on the EU’s flawed vision for the Southern Gas Corridor as a so-called substitute to Europe’s dependency on Russian gas imports, see the report Pipe Dreams: Why the Southern Gas Corridor will not reduce EU dependency on Russia released in January by CEE Bankwatch Network:
https://bankwatch.org/news-media/for-journalists/press-releases/pipe-dreams-why-southern-gas-corridor-will-not-reduce-eu-d