Azerbaijan¶
The Azerbaijani cases show journalism prosecuted without being named. By treating the money that sustains independent reporting as the crime, the state moves the case into financial law, where what was published is beside the point and the defendants’ account of their work has no standing. The method depends on courts that accept the framing, and on independent outlets’ dependence on foreign funding.
The clerk’s briefs¶
From the clerks, for the Patrician’s eyes
Read these. Journalists still working inside the country now know that funding, not content, is where the state will strike, and some will stop taking the money or stop the work. Foundations abroad become a source of evidence against those they support, and their protests can be cited as proof of the tie. Readers lose reporting without any law against it being passed. Other governments in the region can adopt the method without changing their press laws; a ruling from Strasbourg would raise its cost but would not undo the sentences on its own.
April 2026: The appeal refused¶
On 3 April 2026 Azerbaijan’s Supreme Court upheld the sentences of six Abzas Media journalists and of the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty correspondent Farid Mehralizada. The clerks note that the domestic courts have now said everything they are going to say.
June 2025: Seven to nine years¶
On 20 June 2025 a court in Baku sentenced journalists of Abzas Media and a reporter for the Azerbaijani service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty to terms “from seven to nine years”. They were first arrested on charges of “currency smuggling”; prosecutors later added money laundering. The outlet’s director, Ulvi Hasanli, and its editor-in-chief, Sevinc Vaqifgizi, received nine years each. The clerks note that the convictions are for financial offences, and that the journalists, who deny the charges, say the case punishes their reporting.