Azerbaijan detains 88 over school hijab protests, activist says
An activist alleges police abuse in Nardaran and says most detainees face criminal proceedings without access to independent lawyers.
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An activist alleges police abuse in Nardaran and says most detainees face criminal proceedings without access to independent lawyers.
An activist says 88 people were detained in Azerbaijan’s village of Nardaran over protests against school restrictions on the hijab, an Islamic head covering. Most face criminal proceedings, according to Alamdar Bunyatov, an activist with the European representation of the Muslim Unity Movement.
On 22 October, OC Media reported that Bunyatov had told Qəzetçi about the detentions. Authorities had earlier reported 37 detentions during protests against the restrictions, according to OC Media. The relationship between the two counts remains unclear.
Bunyatov alleged that police treated detained cousins Mammad Rustamzada and Kamran Rustamov with particular brutality. Both face criminal charges, he said.
He said Azerbaijan’s Interior Ministry’s Main Directorate for Combating Organised Crime was conducting the raids. He also alleged that police pressured residents and that detainees’ relatives were warned their family members could face torture in custody if they shared information with the media.
Qəzetçi said it contacted the Interior Ministry’s press service about the Nardaran raids but received no response to its questions.
Bunyatov said detainees lacked independent lawyers and their families had not been told about the possibility of receiving state-appointed legal counsel. He said these circumstances made it difficult to obtain information about those detained.
Some detainees had been placed under administrative arrest, separate from criminal proceedings, while criminal cases had been opened against most, Bunyatov said.
Four other village residents facing criminal cases — Rasim Asgarov, Hikmat Valiyev, Ilgar Agarzayev and Alimukhtar Aslanov — had been remanded in custody for three months and transferred to a pre-trial detention facility, according to Bunyatov.
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