Russian media claims that Azerbaijani police beat and detained its citizens on false charges
The independent Russian media outlet Agentstvo has claimed that the bulk of Russian nationals arrested by Azerbaijani authorities in recent days are IT workers who relocated to the country following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Tensions between Azerbaijan and Russia have sharply escalated over the past week following a police raid on ethnic Azerbaijanis in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg in late June, which resulted in the deaths of two Azerbaijanis. Russian authorities have claimed the two individuals — brothers Ziyaddin and Huseyn Safarov — died of natural causes, while Azerbaijan has said police beat and tortured them to death.
Aytan Farhadova
The group of 11 Russians were arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking and committing cyber crimes at the end of June, and paraded in front of Azerbaijani media. Many displayed visible injuries, prompting accusations that they had been abused by Azerbaijani police.
Citing publicly available information, Agentstvo wrote that only one of the individuals had a previous criminal conviction — on minor gambling charges — despite claims from Azerbaijani authorities that the group was operating as an organised criminal ring.
On Thursday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said that Baku had granted consular access to 13 Russian nationals detained in the country, which had reportedly been previously denied. In addition to the above-mentioned 11 individuals, Zakharova was likely also referring to two employees of the Baku branch of the Russian state-run media outlet Sputnik who had been arrested on espionage charges on 30 June.
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesperson Aykhan Hajizada claimed on Wednesday that the allegations that the detainees had been mistreated or denied access to consular services were ‘unfounded’.
‘It should be noted that the Azerbaijani side has never publicised and politicised the weeks-long delays in Russia’s responses to our repeated appeals for organising consular meetings with Azerbaijani citizens detained and held in prisons in various cities of Russia’, he added.
Rhetoric and tit-for-tat responses escalate
As relations between the once comparatively close allies continued to deteriorate, both sides appeared to make more tit-for-tat responses.
The pro-government Azerbaijani media outlet APA reported on Thursday that access to ‘.az’ domains had been blocked on mobile providers in Russia. There was no explanation provided as to why that was the case.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Federal Bailiff Service (FSSP) also ‘initiated enforcement proceedings’ against Azerbaijani-Russian oligarch Aras Agalarov, the Russian media outlet Vedomosti reported on Wednesday. However, the proceedings were originally filed on 27 June — the same day the deaths of the Safarov brothers were first reported — and followed an original ‘writ execution’ filed in May. It is unclear if proceedings against Agalarov, the details of which were not specified, were connected to the wider tensions between Moscow and Baku.
The Russian Foreign Ministry’s Situation and Crisis Centre Department published a travel advisory for Russian nationals visiting Azerbaijan on Wednesday, urging them to exercise ‘increased caution’.
Nonetheless, a prominent Russian travel agency told the state-run news agency TASS that despite the tension, tours were still operating in Azerbaijan.
Russian propagandists and military bloggers continued to escalate their anti-Azerbaijan rhetoric, with some accusing Baku of acting as a NATO proxy against Russia.
Others suggested, without providing any evidence, that Azerbaijanis had helped facilitate Ukraine’s audacious drone strike against Russian bombers deep behind the front line at the beginning of June.
Echoing the sentiments used to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, some also called for the ‘denazification’ of Azerbaijan.
Nate Ostiller
