The arrest of an Azerbaijani journalist in Ukraine marks a fresh instance of free-media-wary Azerbaijan having a critical reporter apprehended outside its borders.
Fikret Huseynli, who survived a beating and stabbing in his native Azerbaijan a decade ago, was arrested on October 14 at Boryspil International Airport in Kyiv as he was about to board a fight to Dusseldorf. He managed to alert his friends about his situation via Facebook before Ukrainian police took him into custody. A local court must still consider Azerbaijan’s extradition request, Ukrainian rights activists report.
The arrest sparked fears that the post-Soviet world is becoming increasingly unsafe for journalists at odds with the Azerbaijani government. In less than a year, Azerbaijan has had two journalists detained in two fellow ex-Soviet republics (Ukraine and Belarus) and is suspected of being involved in the abduction of a third in Georgia.
Now a Dutch citizen, Huseynli, a former journalist for the anti-government Azerbaijani newspaper Azadliq, is wanted in his native Azerbaijan on charges of alleged fraud, falsification of official documents and illegal migration. Ukraine’s reasons for honoring Azerbaijan’s request to arrest him are not clear.
Similar confusion met Belarus’ decision last year to detain travel blogger Alexander Lapshin, an Israeli-Russian-Ukrainian citizen, at the behest of Azerbaijan. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev eventually pardoned him after Lapshin was tried and convicted in Baku on illegal-border-crossing charges.