Incident

Incident

Person accused of joining radical group and attempting to start military struggle: â€œFor the first time I heard about jihad from Gamet Suleymanov in Abu Bakr mosqueâ€

24 December 2008 11:18 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Ramil Mammadli â€“ APA. Hearing on the case of former officer of Azerbaijani Army Kamran Asadov and 19 others was held in the Sourt of Grave Crimes. APA reports that judge Islam Neymanov presided over the process. Defendant Terlan Karimov petitioned for refusing his lawyer Yaver Huseyn. The court granted the petition.
Following this, defendant Samir Aliyev gave testimony. He said he had known the other defendants since 2007. Aliyev did not agree to the accusations shown in the criminal case and said he had seen Kamran Asadov only once, in the house of other defendant Kamran Babayev on October 21, 2007. Samir Aliyev said he had attended the meeting in Babayevâ€™s house in â€œElektrotokâ€ settlement for planning the crime mentioned in the indictment, but did not join the common talks.
He said he did not support jihad in Azerbaijan. Later Samir Aliyev answered the questions of the prosecutor, judge and lawyers. Samir Aliyev said he did not admit the accusations concerning jihad.
â€œJihad is mentioned in most ayats of the Koran and it makes up the main part of Islam. For the first time I heard about jihad from Haji Gamet Suleymanov in Abu Bakr mosque. If this is the problem, ask him about it,â€ he said.
Samir Aliyevâ€™s lawyer and prosecutor had a conflict in the hearing. The lawyer said the inspector had carried out biased investigation.
The hearing will continue in the second half of the day.
Kamran Asadov, Bakhtiyar Orujov, Farid Jabbarov, Elshan Mammadov, Kamran Babayev, Samir Mehbaliyev, Terlan Karimov, Edgar Aliyev, Ramil Karimov, Shirvani Babayev, Samir Aliyev, Yalchin Maharramov, Orkhan ALizadeh, Hajibala Huseynov, Azer Ibadov, Shahriyar Mehraliyev, Ramin Jalilov, Rovshan Abdulaliyev, Ilkin Ismayilov and Vugar Aliyev are accused of setting up a radical religious group, attempting to start military struggle, attacking on LUKoil petrol station in Baku, preparing terror attack on the U.S. and UK embassies in Azerbaijan.