BAKU - A hotbed of political dissent in central Baku has come under pressure from state authorities in a property dispute that could put critics of Azerbaijan’s government out on the street. Home to an opposition party, four critical publications and a media freedom pressure group, the tenants of the Azadliq newspaper building on 33 Khagani Street face a court battle they fear they can not win. “The attempt to kick us out is clearly a political act,” said Mehman Aliyev, head of the independent Turan news agency, which occupies one of the offices in the building.
AzerbaijanÂ’s state property committee, the buildingÂ’s owner, earlier this week asked a court to evict the tenants for not paying some 35,000 dollars in rent. The Azadliq newspaper, which sublets the premises to the other organizations, claims the authorities granted it unlimited unpaid use of the building in 1992 when a government that the paper supported was in power.
Now the paper fears a court loyal to the government of President Ilham Aliyev will rule in favor of the property committee, leaving the publications and the opposition Popular Front party homeless. “I doubt we will be able to win this case because it is politically motivated. Everybody knows the courts are not independent and answer to the authorities,” said Azer Ahmedov, general director of Azadliq.
The case comes amid a general increase in pressure on the media and Azadliq in particular, which saw one of its journalists jailed for three years on a drug charge widely criticized as politically motivated earlier this month. An increasing number of other journalists and newspapers have been ordered to pay hefty fines in libel cases filed by high ranking officials since parliamentary elections gave pro-Aliyev parties a landslide victory in 2005.