NEWSLETTER FROM THE HUMAN RIGHTS HOUSE NETWORK

The Azeri authorities must stop its harassment of independent journalists, political activists and human rights defenders. This is the message in a statement signed by activists from established and emerging Human Rights Houses in ten countries, as well as the OSCE, the Swedish Helsinki Committee, and the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR) that co-hosted a conference 7-10 September in Baku, Azerbaijan. UN Special Representative for human rights defenders, Hina Jilani, also attended.

The Azeri government continues to restrict freedom of speech, press and assembly. It is feared that the situation wil worsen in the run-up to the elections in November.

The statement contains recommendations to the Azeri authorities, the media, the international oil companies and to Azeri human rights defenders and their organisations. It was presented at a press conference in Baku on the same day as the Azeri election campaign was launched.

Broad international support to Azeri defenders
The aim of the international meeting was to focus on the human rights situation in Azerbaijan and provide support to Azeri human rights defenders. Read the programme
- I firmly believe that the strong international presence that these arrangements demonstrated served towards Azeri authorities as a signal of international awareness, solidarity and support to Azeri human rights defenders, says Executive Director of HRH, Maria Dahle, in an interview .

Jilani's first visit to Caucasus
UN Special Representative for human rights defenders, Hina Jilani, attended the meeting. This was Jilanis first visit to the troubled Caucasus region.

To learn how to appeal to the UN, 28 human rights activists from Azerbaijan, Georgia and Russia participated in an interactive workshop, lead by the Geneva-based ISHR.

Big, orange demonstrations
Several protesters were beaten up in a rally held 25 September, according to the BBC.
On the last day of the gathering in Baku, some of the delgates monitored another huge rally, staged by the opposition, and demanding the retirement of the current President Ilham Aliyev. The rally, reiterating the recent succesful similar protests in Ukraine, was all in orange.

Prevented from attending
Stanislav Dmitrievski of the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society, a Nizhny-Novgorod- based human rights organisation, had to appear before a regional court and was hence prevented from attending the conference in Baku. The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders are seriously concerned about the judicial harassment against Dmitrievsky, which visibly aims at hindering his organisation's human rights activities.

On arrival at Baku International Airport, the three delegates Beatrice Nyabuto and Martin Oluoch, both of Kenya, and Joseph Akwenyi Manoba of Uganda, were taken aside and detained for ten hours , with no further explanation. They were released after international pressure from the OSCE and others.

Human Rights House emerging in Baku
To strengthen human rights work, a group of Azeri human rights NGOs is working to set up a Human Rights House in Baku together with HRH in Oslo.

Representatives from each of the currently eleven established and emerging Human Rights Houses meet annually to enhance co-operation and solidarity between them. This was the first Human Rights House Network meeting to be organised by an emerging House - the Human Rights House of Baku.

******************************************************************
Free of charge news and background service from the Human
Rights House Network, an international forum of cooperation between
independent human rights houses. It works to strengthen cooperation and
improve the security and capacity of the 70 human rights organizations in
the Network. The Human Rights House Foundation in Oslo is the
secretariat.

To subscribe, please send an email to:
newsletter-subscribe@humanrightshouse.org

More news and background on www.humanrightshouse.org

******************************************************************
Editors:

Niels Jacob Harbitz and Borghild T. Krokan
Human Rights House Foundation (HRH)
Address: Menneskerettighetshuset,
Tordenskioldsgate 6b, 0160 Oslo, Norway
Tel: (+47) 22 47 92 47, Direct: (+47) 22 47 92 44,
Fax: (+47) 22 47 92 01
Website: http://www.humanrightshouse.org,
http://www.menneskerettigheter.no