Eynulla Fatullayev - Threats, Assaults, and Kidnappings of Family

Threats, Assaults, and Kidnappings of Family

Threats, intimidation and violence have been used against Eynulla Fatullayev to influence his journalism, including death threats, beatings, legal prosecution, and the kidnapping of family members in Azerbaijan. On 26 July 2004, he was severely beaten with blows to the head on a street in Baku for his articles critical of the government. Eynulla Fatullayev was also called to face a fine of 25,000 Euros and to be jailed for "insulting the name and dignity" of a deputy in the ruling party, Siyavush Novruzov.

In early August 2006, Minister Usubov filed three criminal defamation suits against Fatullayev in response to articles titled “The revenge of the antibiotic,” “The failure of the antibiotic,” and “The antibiotic and journalists,” published in July and August, which alleged ties between the Interior Ministry official Ramil Usubov and Haji Mammadov, a former Interior Ministry official who was on trial for murder and kidnapping. On 26 September 2006, Judge Malakhat Abdulmanafova of the Yasamal District Court in Baku convicted Fatullayev of criminal libel and insult and sentenced him to a conditional two-year prison term, ordered him to publish a retraction, and pay a fine of US$11,300 in moral damages to Usubov. Fatullayev suspects this was in retaliation to his critical publications against the Interior Ministry.

On 1 October 2006, Fatullayev was forced to suspend publication of both papers after his father was kidnapped. The kidnappers threatened to kill Fatullayev, as well as his father, if Fatullayev continued to publish the papers. The kidnapping had been preceded by numerous phone threats against Fatullayev and his family. Fatullayev told Human Rights Watch:

Starting on September 27, I personally, my family, and the paper’s commercial director got frequent phone calls warning us to stop writing critical articles against the Interior Minister Ramil Usubov, or they were going to kill me like Elmar Husseinov ... They called my mother and threatened to murder the entire family if I did not stop writing.... On September 31, several unidentified, armed people kidnapped my father, blindfolded him, and took him to some kind of a country house. I received a phone call demanding that I stop publication of my newspapers or I would loose (sic) my father... The next morning I announced the closure of the papers. Only then my father was released.