Baku court sentences researcher Baruz Samadov to 15 years in prison

ArmInfo. The Baku Court of Grave Crimes found Bahruz Samadov, a doctoral student at the Department of Political Science at Charles University (Prague),  guilty of treason and sentenced him to 15 years in prison - in fact,  for correspondence with residents of Armenia and a public anti-war  position, writes the BBC Russian Service.

According to the investigation, the young scientist wrote and  translated articles criticizing the Azerbaijani authorities at the  request of the Armenian special services.

However, the convicted man himself consistently and categorically  denies this - and his defense never tires of reminding that the  charges are based solely on Bahruz's correspondence with three  Armenian women confiscated from him.

"But there is nothing in this correspondence that constitutes the  crime of 'treason'," said his lawyer Zibeyda Sadygova. "There is  nothing there that would have given Samadov an assignment on some  state-important issue, and Bakhruz would have carried out this  assignment." At the same time, according to the defense lawyers of  the convicted political scientist, Samadov is known in his homeland  for his sharp criticism of the Azerbaijani authorities, which he  openly expressed in foreign publications.

The defense claims that the real reason for the arrest was precisely  the scientist's anti-war views, and this "was reflected in the case  materials."

The criminal case against Samadov became known in August last year,  when, having arrived in Baku for the holidays, he first disappeared,  and soon it became known about his arrest. It was later revealed that  the case against the political scientist was initiated by the State  Security Service of Azerbaijan (SSS) under Article 274 (treason) for  the alleged cooperation of the Azerbaijani political scientist with  the Armenian special services.

In April, having spent more than six months in jail, Samadov  addressed an open letter to Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan,  in which he asked to officially confirm that in fact there was no  cooperation with the Armenian special services.

The Criminal Code of Azerbaijan provides for punishment for high  treason in the form of imprisonment for a term of 12 to 20 years, and  in some cases, life imprisonment. The SSS asked the judge to send  Samadov to prison for 16 years.

As his grandmother Zibeyda Osmanova told journalists, on June 19,  after learning about the term the prosecutor's office was demanding  for him, Bahruz Samedov went on a dry hunger strike in the detention  center. When there was no reaction to this, two days later, last  Saturday, Samadov attempted suicide in the pretrial detention center.