A sixteen-year-old Azerbaijani teenager has committed suicide at a a shelter which specialises in working with victims of human trafficking. According to media reports, the girl had jumped from a fourth-floor window in the building.
The girl, identified by media as Nurjan Jafarova, reportedly committed suicide on Wednesday at the Tamiz Dunya shelter in Baku. She survived the fall, but died as a result of her injuries hours later.
The Binagadi District Prosecutor’s Office is investigating the incident.
Jafarova, originally from the Shamkir district, had been living in the shelter since 11 September.
Pro-government media outlet Milli.az has cited the State Social Service Agency as saying that Jafarova’s mother, Vusala Orujova, died in 2014, while her father resided in Russia.
On 21 August, Jafarova ran away from her relatives' home before being resettled in the shelter.
‘After returning to the country, her father, Elshad Safarov, officially abandoned the child on November 18’, the State Social Service Agency said, adding that Jafarova received social and psychological rehabilitation at the shelter.
Despite saying that Jafarova’s father had abandoned her, Azerbaijani legislation stipulates that parents do not have the right to abandon or disown their children. The agency has not provided any explanation as to how the teenager was left without a legal guardian.
Qafqazinfo reported that the shelter also shared a statement that this is the first suicide to have taken place at the shelter. It noted that Jafarova had wanted to return home, but that none of her relatives wanted to take care of her.
‘Although her aunt repeatedly promised to take her in, unfortunately, she never applied for foster care or took any real steps. We repeatedly informed the Social Services Agency about the girl’s condition’, the shelter stated, as reported by Qafqazinfo.
According to the shelter, Jafarova completely lost hope right after receiving information that her father ‘abandoned her’.
As reports of Jafarova’s suicide emerged, Kamala Aghazada, the head of another shelter, said on social media that a teenage girl from her shelter had gone missing. While the girl was found a day later, Aghazada noted that most children
‘However, since parental rights are not restricted, contact with the family is maintained, and in the absence of a direct crime against the child, meetings with the parents continue’, Aghazada said.
Aytan Farhadova
