CSF Election monitoring activists urged the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) to review the case of Anar Mammadli

Election monitoring activists from the Civil Society Forum of the Eastern Partnership (EaP-CSF) have urged the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) to review the case of Anar Mammadli, a respected Azeri civil rights activist, who has been imprisoned by the authorities there.

Mammadli, who is in pretrial detention, has been charged with tax evasion arising from grants donated to his EMDS election monitoring organization for the presidential election Azerbaijan last October. The EaP-CSF rejects the charges as groundless and politically motivated.

Krzysztof Bobinski, the head of the EaP CSF elections sub group, has said in a letter sent to Jean-Claude Mignon, the PACE president and other Assembly leaders, that the Council of Europe (CoE) should consider whether it should allow Azerbaijan to chair the CoE’s committee of ministers, a key decision making body, as long as Mammadli and over a hundred political detainees are kept in prison. Azerbaijan is due to take over the chair of the committee of ministers in May 2014 for a six month stint.

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