Sentence of Azerbaijani journalist Fikret Faramazoglu reduced by one year

The Supreme Court (SC) of Azerbaijan has partially granted a cassation appeal filed by journalist Fikret Faramazoglu and reduced his sentence from seven to six years of imprisonment. The defence does not agree with this verdict and will appeal to the European Court of Human Rights.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Fikret Faramazoglu, the editor-in-chief of the website "Jam.az", was accused of extorting money from restaurant owners under threat to write critical articles about their restaurants. According to investigators, the journalist was detained red-handed when taking a bribe. On June 14, 2017, the court sentenced him to seven years of imprisonment.

Today, the Supreme Court of Azerbaijan has considered the cassation appeal filed against the verdict to Fikret Faramazoglu, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was informed by advocate Elchin Sadygov.

According to him, in the cassation appeal, the defence requested to stop the criminal proceedings on justifiable grounds.

The SC has re-classified the charge from Article 182.2.4 (extortion by threats with the purpose of obtaining property in a considerable amount) to Article 182.2.2 (extortion with the purpose of obtaining property) of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan and reduced the sentence from seven to six years of imprisonment, the advocate reported. "That is, while earlier, Fikret was charged with extortion in order to seize property in a significant amount, then now 'a significant amount' has been withdrawn from the charge. However, that fact did not change the essence of the guilty verdict and mitigated the sentence by one year only," Elchin Sadygov said.

The advocate has reported that the defence does not agree with the verdict and will appeal to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to recognize violations of the journalist's rights guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on September 26, 2018 at 02:12 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.