Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.[KavkazUzel] Arrested in Baku, a member of the Muslim Unity movement,
| ...also in our archives as the unregistered Movement For Muslim Unity, in Arabic as Al Tawheed. They describe themselves as a peaceful Shiite Islamic soci-political movement calling for democratic reform and religious liberties, but it’s clear from context that they mean the peace that comes from submission to Khomeini Shiism and Iran. In practice they’ve been involved in the usual murder, terrorism, organized mass riots, and attempted armed insurrection, exactly on the Khomeini model... |
| Possibly he was. Quite probably he would complain about it even if he’d instead been bathed in asses’ milk and fed blini with sour cream and caviar. |
Agali Yakhyaev was sentenced in 2017 in the Nardaran case to 15 years in prison. However, in March 2021, he was released early under a presidential clemency order. In May 2022, the court sent Yakhyaev under arrest for 30 days, finding him guilty of hooliganism and disobedience to the police at a rally in support of another activist of the Muslim Unity movement.
On September 3, Agali Yakhyaev called from the Baku SIZO-1 and said that after his detention he was tortured, his wife Shakhana Gasanova said today at a press conference .
“Agali said that when on August 31 he was driving for his mother to pick her up from the dacha, he was stopped at a traffic light in the village of Mehtiabad (10 kilometers north of Baku) by employees of the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for combating drug trafficking. They took Agali to the Mehtiabad police station [ where he] was subjected to horrific torture. He was told that he had to confess to committing a drug-related crime - they say that such an order came from "above". They forced him to incriminate himself.
Agali said that in addition to torture, he was subjected to even more difficult conditions, about which he could not talk on the phone. "I understand that he was also blackmailed by troubles for his family members, that is, us. As a result, he was forced to confess," Gasanova said, adding that she brought Yakhyaev to the defense lawyer who will appeal the arrest.
Shakhana Hasanova stressed that this is the third arrest of Yakhyaev on fabricated criminal charges. "My husband was arrested for the first time in February 2010when he participated in a peaceful action dedicated to the day of the death of the Prophet Muhammad. Then he was given 4.5 years in prison on charges of resisting the police and hooliganism. The next time he was arrested in November 2015 in the village of Nardaran, where he participated in a religious event dedicated to the month of Muharram. This time, those arrested were accused of serious crimes, including terrorism, although there was no evidence of their guilt, the entire criminal case was falsified. Agali then received 15 years. But in 2021, he was pardoned. And yet - last year, Agali was imprisoned for 30 days on an administrative case," she said at a press conference attended by the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.
Shakhana Gasanova told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that her 39-year-old husband was the sole breadwinner in a family with two children of school age.
Lawyer Zibeyda Sadygova told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent today that she had not had time to meet with Yakhyaev yet. According to the lawyer, today she will sign an agreement with Yahyaev's wife, after which she will officially join the defense and first of all file an appeal against the arrest, and then she will seek a meeting with him. "If Agali Yakhyaev tells me that he was tortured, then we will probably file a complaint with the prosecutor's office," the lawyer said.
An employee of the press service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs denied allegations of torture of Yakhyaev by the police. "Such fabrications are spread for the purpose of self-defence," he explained to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.
Recall that in early March, Azerbaijani human rights activists noted that against the backdrop of deteriorating relations with Iran, the vector of political repression in Azerbaijan shifted from pro-Western activists to members of Muslim Unity. Over the past two or three months, about 90 people have been arrested in Azerbaijan on charges of drug trafficking. Their arrests are accompanied by a propaganda campaign to expose the Iranian spy network, but they are charged with drug trafficking, Elshan Hasanov, head of the Center for Monitoring Political Prisoners, said at the time.