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Fuad Aleskerov: StrÃ¤sserâ€™s statement casts serious doubt on his objectivity, shows his biased attitude towards Azerbaijan â€“ INTERVIEW

Fuad Aleskerov: StrÃ¤sserâ€™s statement casts serious doubt on his objectivity, shows his biased attitude towards Azerbaijan â€“ <font color=red>INTERVIEW</font>

04 November 2011 15:22 (UTC +04:00)

APA presents the interview with the official of the Presidential Administration.

- The problem of political prisoners has widely covered by press recently. It was caused by the postponement of the PACE rapporteurâ€™s visit to Azerbaijan and his interview to a newspaper. The positions concerning this issue differ considerably. We would like to know you opinion on this.

-First of all, I want to say that the reports that Azerbaijan refused to issue visa to StrÃ¤sser are not true. The rapporteur has not received an official visa denial. He was planning to visit our country on November 4, but on October 28 it was reported that the rapporteur cancelled his visit because of the lack of the consent of the Azerbaijani side. Lack of reply, though certain time is left till the planned visit, and official visa denial are not the same. Mr. StrÃ¤sserâ€™s interview was published on October 28-29. It contains statements, which not only cause surprise, but also are incompatible with the status of rapporteur and run counter to the decision of the PACE committee.

-Which decision do you mean?

-On October 5, this year PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights passed a decision to rename the report that would be made concerning it. Initially, the report was entitled â€œDefinition of political prisoners / Continuation of the consideration of the problem of political prisoners in Azerbaijanâ€, now it is entitled â€œReconsideration of the problem of political prisonersâ€, it means that the report will cover the situation not only in Azerbaijan, but also in all member states of the Council of Europe. Azerbaijan has repeatedly stated that the Council of Europe must avoid discrimination and double standards in its activity, must remain strictly committed to its principles. The problem of political prisoners must be either raised with regard to any country, or must not be raised at all. We have carried this point for long years. With this regard I think the decision to rename the PACEâ€™s report and apply it on other countries, as well, is the victory of common sense and display of more unbiased attitude towards this problem. But despite the decision of the PACE, Mr. StrÃ¤sser said in his interview that the future report would be exceptionally related to Azerbaijan. Moreover, without having viewed any material he stated that the report would not be positive for our country. This statement of the rapporteur casts serious doubt on his objectivity and shows his biased attitude towards Azerbaijan.

- The rapporteur noted in his interview that Azerbaijan is not only country where the problem of political prisoners were raised. He reminded that the notion of â€œpolitical prisonerâ€ and criteria for its definition have been implemented toward Armenia as well.

- If we refer to the history of the problem, we see that in 2001, the experts appointed by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe reviewed two issues concerning Armenia. In both cases, persons, whose cases were reviewed, were not recognized as the political prisoners. PACE has not turned to the issue of political prisoners in Armenia once more, though, it seems, the developments in Armenia gave rise to it. PACE has not adopted any document about the political prisoners in Armenia since 2001. It concerns criteria as well. They were exceptionally adopted for hearing of the cases of presumed political prisoners in Armenia and Azerbaijan. Apart from two cases in 2001, they have not been implemented toward Armenia once more though Azerbaijan raised the issue of existence of the cases in Armenia needed in reviewing in PACE. No other member-state of the Council of Europe didnâ€™t give consent to implement these criteria toward itself. Consequently, indeed Azerbaijan is the only country, toward which these criteria have been implemented for years. With that, it is absolutely clear that if the report on the problem of political prisoners concerns any European country, all countries must express their opinion about the current criteria via PACE or agree with their implementation or new same criteria must be prepared for all countries.

- Taking renaming of the PACE Committeeâ€™s report on political prisoners into consideration, what renewed mandate should the rapporteur receive?

- I consider that after the expression of the Assemblyâ€™s opinion regarding the possible criteria, the rapporteur should assess the situation in all countries where political prisoners reported exist. I think the report should cover at least all South Caucasus. To the point, this is not only my opinion, a number of local and foreign human right organizations think so. In 2010, Human Rights House Tbilisi issued an open letter on behalf of some international NGOs to PACE President MevlÃ¼t Ã‡avuÅŸoÄŸlu, PACE Secretary General ThÃ¸rbjorn Jagland, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Thomas Hammarberg, President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso and President of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek. The letter reads that there were about 60 political prisoners in Georgia in that time. The NGO called on the Council of Europe to send independent experts to Georgia, as well as to send PACE rapporteur on political prisoners to all three countries of the South Caucasus until the end of 2010.

- I would like to turn to the StrÃ¤sserâ€™s statements. Along with other issues, he claimed that Azerbaijan attempts to bribe members of the PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights and other persons through some lobbyists. How do you comment on this statement?

- Rapporteur StrÃ¤sser has demonstrated discriminatory treatment toward our country many times in his interview. But his words are not only manifestation of discriminatory treatment. He makes statement about the action, which is considered by the legislation of all countries and international agreements as the criminal case. Making such statement, any person should give convincing evidences to prove his thoughts or to take responsibility for his groundless claims.