Imprisoned Azerbaijani politician Tofig Yagublu ends hunger strike after 40 days

Imprisoned Azerbaijani opposition politician Tofig Yagublu has ended his hunger strike after 40 days following a stream of reports warning of his deteriorating health condition.

On Sunday, Yagublu’s daughter, Nigar Hazi, wrote that her father had ended his hunger strike at her request.

She wrote that during the previous evening, Yagublu had suddenly fallen ill and was ‘shaking and feeling nauseous’ after being administered medicine at the penitentiary clinic.

‘In the morning, we saw him again in a wheelchair, terribly tired, with his eyes closed and without strength. He could not open his eyes, and his vision was very bad. He took the soup that we brought with us to the meeting and some products that need to be consumed at the initial stage, although in small quantities’, she said.

Yagublu was sentenced to nine years in prison on charges of fraud and forgery in mid-March and has been on a hunger strike since 1 April in protest against the court’s ruling.

Yagublu has repeatedly denied all accusations against him and has stated that his arrest was politically motivated.

‘Yesterday, my father’s decision to stop the hunger strike brought him back from the brink of death, and us, as a family, back to life after the tragedy. If my father had not called me yesterday by coincidence, and I had not heard his dying voice, his last breath, my father would not be alive today’, Hazi wrote.

Yagublu was detained in December 2023 — his eighth arrest in Azerbaijan over the last years.

He previously served time in prison between 2013–2017 on charges of organising protests in Ismayilli, northern Azerbaijan. He was released in 2017 as part of an official pardon.

In March 2020, he was arrested again, this time on charges of hooliganism. According to the prosecution, Yagublu had been involved in a traffic accident, after which he insulted and caused bodily harm to the driver of the other car and his wife. In September 2020, the Nizami District Court sentenced him to four years and three months in prison.

Immediately after the verdict was announced, Yagublu stated that he had started a hunger strike in protest against the ruling. He continued the hunger strike for 17 days before being transferred to a clinic.

Later that month, he was released on house arrest by the Baku Court of Appeals.

Imprisoned Azerbaijani politician Yagublu’s health deteriorates as hunger strike approaches 40th day

Adil Geybulla, the doctor of imprisoned politician Tofig Yagublu, was not allowed to visit him in prison.

OC MediaAytan Farhadova