Imprisoned journalist Fatima Movlamli ended her hunger strike on Tuesday after Elnur Ismailov, the head of the Baku Pretrial Detention Centre, reportedly backed down on new restrictions that required all meetings to be held through a glass partition.
Movlamli was detained as part of the criminal case against independent media outlet Meydan TV in February 2025 and accused of smuggling.
She announced she was going on a hunger strike in protest of the ban on meetings without a glass partition on 8 March.
The news about the ban was circulated after protests by the detained journalists of Meydan TV Aytaj Ahmadova (Tapdig), Aysel Umudova, Khayala Aghayeva, and Ulviyya Guliyeva (Ali) in the detention centre.
On 26 February, they had refused to meet with family in the visiting room where a glass partition had been installed.
Ahmadova told her mother that the detention centre administration cancelled open meetings to all prisoners in the centre, as well as journalists.
Aytan Farhadova
Later, Movlamli’s mother said she had started a hunger strike, adding that after her daughter’s decision, all her belongings had been confiscated by prison officials.
‘The journalist’s main demand is the restoration of the right to open meetings with family members and the protection of the detainee’s rights’, wrote Movlamli’s mother Vusala Movlamova.
On Tuesday, Movlamova stated that her daughter ended her hunger strike.
‘The Baku Pretrial Detention Centre administration promised to allow prisoners to openly meet with their families’, she wrote.
Following Movlamli’s decision to go on a hunger strike, Meydan TV editor-in-chief Aynur Ganbarova (Elgunesh) also refused to attend a family meeting through a glass partition.
Although Movlami has now ended her hunger strike, other imprisoned individuals in the detention centre have continued theirs, including prominent opposition leader Tofig Yagublu, currently on the 18th day of his hunger strike, and Nurlan Gahramanli, an imprisoned journalist in the Meydan TV case, who started a hunger strike on 16 January.
Both are protesting their unfair arrests and demanding their immediate release.
Aytan Farhadova
