Relatives of the Azerbaijani activist lost contact with him
Azerbaijani activist Ali Zeynal, a figure in the Toplum TV case, who has been in custody since the beginning of March 2024, has stopped communicating. This was reported by the relatives of the arrested person, who feared that he had been placed in a solitary confinement cell.
According to them, a telephone conversation with Alya was scheduled for April 25, but they never received the call. It is noteworthy that at the court session held the day before, Zeinal together with the other defendants demanded the dismissal of the prosecutor Rauf Malyshov due to his bias. According to the defendants, the state prosecutor "openly supports the prosecution side also in the case against Abzas Media." In addition, as Meydan TV writes, the defendants in the case demanded that the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, be questioned as a witness, and the Prosecutor General substantiate the charges brought against them.
Aly Zeinal, an employee of the Institute of Democratic Initiatives, was detained on March 6, 2024. The next day, according to the lawyer, the activist was beaten by security forces because he refused to give them the computer password. After that, Zeynal unsuccessfully tried to get an investigation into the fact of the use of violence by law enforcement officers.
Activists and journalists arrested in the Toplum TV case were charged with currency smuggling. In addition, in January new charges were brought against them on six criminal articles punishable by up to 12 years in prison.
Toplum TV is an independent platform that has been operating since 2016 and covers public-political and social-economic events. In particular, journalists of the publication published materials about violations and falsifications that took place in the presidential elections in February 2024.
The international organization "Reporters Without Borders" has repeatedly drawn attention to the "large-scale attack on the independent press in Azerbaijan." The country ranks 164th out of 180 countries in the RSF World Press Freedom Index for 2024.
