Representative of Presidential Administration: Freedom House has filled and even overfilled the tasks set by the party and the government

"Every year, an international non-governmental organization Freedom House publishes its annual report, which reflects the inadequate information on the number of states, including Azerbaijan. A group of so-called experts, using a significantly unfounded and unverified information as well as imperfect methodology based solely on the sample of one state, attribute a cliche "free", "partially free", "not free" to all countries, etc", said the head of department of political analysis and information support of the Presidential Administration Elnur Aslanov today.

 "It may seem strange, but  I remember the phrase Soviet past. NGO «Freedom House» has fulfilled and overfulfilled the tasks set by the party and the government to monitor the democratization of the world. It still uses echo of the past. Perhaps this NGO should be recalled that there is a new world order and the cold war has already ended.

In past years, the Azerbaijani authorities made certain comments on the reports. But why pay attention to every organization that works on order. What to take from those whose principle states: "pay and order the music". Azerbaijan occupies one of the leading places in the world for economic performance during the world economic crisis. We have demonstrated that the economic basis of the state is strong enough, and this allows us "to conduct parallel political and economic reforms".

And can we make progress in economy, using a liberal rule, being a "non-free country"? Is it possible to achieve the development of political and economic institutions, intensive welfare of nation in conditions of the so-called lack of freedom? Of course not. Azerbaijan is paying an increasing attention to civil society. Created by the initiative of President Ilham Aliyev, the State Fund for Support of NGOs, as well as the imminent launch of the Fund's support for the development of the press, give a new impetus to the development of the civil society. This is a practice which is not applied in some developed democracies. But we do not boasting about this and continue to systematically develop the state and society. We are moving purposefully to build an efficient state, an open civil society, free and independent media. The period of transformation of Azerbaijani society does not lose a momentum, and we can see that we are on the right way.

Media is a very important and vital element of the democratic development of society. Naturally, without proper attention to them, we would find it difficult to talk about effective development. Therefore, authorities are doing everything possible and necessary for the media in the country to develop, strengthen and improve. But all this takes time, because the media is a measure of social consciousness, and, as the mass consciousness is democratizing media, is improving. If we analyze the way that we overcame in the past 10 years both in a political and economic, as well as social plans, it becomes obvious that the transformation of Azerbaijani society does not lose a momentum and we are on the right way", said E. Aslanov.