COP in Baku: EU lawmakers want to meet political prisoners

Baku/Vienna/EU-wide – The Austrian Member of the European Parliament Lena Schilling (Green) intends to meet with political prisoners in the authoritarian-ruled country during the UN Climate Conference COP29 in Azerbaijan, together with nine other EU parliamentarians. They demand this in a letter to the Minister of Justice in Baku, Schilling explained on Monday in an online press conference in Brussels. Together with the Azerbaijani activist Zhala Bayramova, she strongly criticized the COP29 host country.

Schilling will travel to Baku next week, together with other representatives of the EU Parliament, for the two-week World Climate Conference that begins today, Monday. She criticizes that the authoritarian regime under the dictator Ilham Aliyev is using the conference to greenwash its country. Schilling also pointed to media reports indicating that the government in Baku plans to use COP29 to negotiate new oil contracts. The country on the Caspian Sea is rich in fossil resources such as oil and gas. Since the Russian attack on Ukraine, the country is considered an alternative supplier of fossil fuels for Europe.

In addition, the press conference highlighted the very poor human rights situation in Azerbaijan. According to the letter dated November 8th, the ten EU parliamentarians also want to meet the Azerbaijani Justice Minister Farid Ahmadov to discuss the “situation of individual activists, journalists, and human rights defenders”. The three prisoners, to whom the members want access, are the environmental activist Anar Mammadli, the journalist Nargiz Absalamova, and the economist and critic of his country’s oil and gas industry, Gubad Ibadoghlu.

Bayramova – the daughter of Ibadoghlu – reiterated in the discussion the repression and violence to which her parents were exposed and are still exposed in their homeland. She also criticized the EU Commission, which had so far refused to contact her, and its President Ursula von der Leyen, who had described the Aliyev regime as a “reliable partner.” Schilling called on the representatives from the European Union participating in COP29 to address the human rights situation in discussions with representatives of Azerbaijan. (11.11.2024)