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PACE Monitoring Committee adopts first version of resolution on Azerbaijan

27 May 2008 17:13 (UTC +04:00)

In a draft resolution approved on Tuesday during a meeting in Kyiv, the committee said media problems and limits on freedom of assembly and association were "inadmissible in a Council of Europe member state", and declared that the issue of â€œpolitical prisonersâ€ had not been resolved and demanded the immediate release of the three arrested journalists.
The parliamentarians spelled out a "road-map" of other urgent steps to be taken ahead of the 15 October election, including:

* ensuring balanced election commissions and an efficient complaints procedure
* providing free broadcast time and print space in state media under equal conditions for political parties and blocs
* guaranteeing the opposition’s right to hold public rallies
On the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict - which Azerbaijan has pledged to solve peacefully - the committee said sustainable democratic development will be extremely difficult in Azerbaijan "as long as the country’s territorial integrity has not been restored".
The resolution is due to be debated by the plenary Assembly during its summer session (23-27 June 2008).