Azerbaijani authorities have arrested an ethnic Talysh researcher on charges of treason and inciting ethnic hatred.

On Wednesday, Igbal Abilov was remanded into four months pre-trial detention. He has also reportedly been barred from receiving visitors, including his family. Abilov was detained by the State Security Service on Monday in the village of Bala Kolatan, in southern Azerbaijan.

Pro-government news site Qafqazinfo.az reported that Abilov is accused of working with the Armenian security services. 

They said he had been accused of ‘organising activities’ against Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, ‘attracting disruptive forces from different countries’, and ‘taking action aimed at creating hatred and enmity on ethnic grounds’.

They said he was accused of making ‘secret negotiations and deals’ via Skype with Armenian academics.

This included Garnik Asatryan, the head of the Institute of Oriental Studies at the Russian–Armenian University in Yerevan, which they accused of ‘conducting targeted work against Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity’.

They also said he was suspected of ‘providing assistance to Vardan Voskanian and others associated with the Armenian Special Service Organisation’. Vardan Voskanian heads the Department of Iranian Studies at Yerevan State University.

Abilov is one of the founders of the Talysh National Academy based in Belarus, and the editor of its namesake magazine. The organisation describes the magazine as ‘the first international scientific publication dedicated to comprehensive study of Talysh’.

Abilov’s father, Shahin Abilov, denied all the allegations against his son. He told OC Media that Abilov, who has lived in Belarus since childhood, was a researcher of many ethnic minorities ‘from the Caucasus to China’, including the Talysh.  

He said his son was first approached by the State Security Service on 22 June, when officers took him for questioning for six hours.

He said his son was asked about his meetings with different people. Abilov met with and kept in contact with many people in Azerbaijan, some of whom were ethnically Talysh.

The following day, he said his son had tried to leave the country but was stopped at the airport where his passport and phone were confiscated.

The subject of Talysh rights and culture have for decades been a sensitive subject for the Azerbaijani authorities. In 1993, a short-lived separatist entity in southern Azerbaijan emerged calling itself the Talysh-Mughan Autonomous Republic. Its leader was soon arrested.

Since then, Azerbaijan has frequently arrested Talysh activists and cultural figures, including on charges of treason.

In November 2020, Talysh historian and activist Fakhraddin Abbasov died in prison, where he was serving 16 years for treason.

In April 2021, Talysh blogger Aslan Gurbanov was sentenced to seven years in prison for ‘inciting national hatred’.

A 2021 report by the Talysh Public Council of Azerbaijan, which advocates for Talysh rights in the country, condemned the Azerbaijani government for not respecting the Talysh language, identity, or rights to education in their own language.

‘The Talysh are not recognised as a people by the Azerbaijani government’, the report stated. ‘The government is pursuing a policy of de facto assimilation of the Talysh.’