Christophe Poirel: Ago Group plans to visit the region in October

“According to the procedure, Ago Group keeps its activity confidential.

But anyway we often have close contacts with the civil societies of the two countries,” Christophe Poirel, Deputy to the Secretary to the CE Committee of Ministers, Secretary of Ago Group, told APA’s Europe bureau.He noted that he as the head of the group or the delegation of the group visit the countries of the region as far as possible.
“Some nongovernmental organizations of Azerbaijan come to Strasbourg during PACE session and every time the president of the group meets with them. We also have close contacts with Azerbaijani ruling party and opposition parties. I want to say that with the exception of the visits, the group keeps its activity confidential. I would not say the group is inactive. We regularly hold meetings concerning the assessment of the situation in both countries. When a problem arises concerning any country, the group takes some steps, but as I have already said this is confidential. For example, we were concerned over the amendments to the law on Azerbaijan-based NGOs and as you know CE Committee of Ministers, PACE President and Secretary General issued joint statement. But before the statement the head of the group had informed Azerbaijan’s permanent representative to CE about this concern and recommended to present the bill to the Venice Commission before adopting it.

Christophe Poirel said the next report on Azerbaijan will be prepared after visiting the region.
“A report is usually prepared after the visit. We visited Azerbaijan in April last year and a report was prepared after the visit. As a rule we visit the region once a year. But now our visit delays a little. The ambassadors of several countries are represented in the group, as they have other work to do we have some difficulties in meeting. We planned to visit the region in May, but we couldn’t. We have decided to visit the region on October 12-17. Of course, this date should be agreed with the schedule ot government representatives of both countries.

Christophe Poirel touched upon the issues related to Azerbaijan and concerned the Ago group: “The most interesting issue for us is the draft law on non-governmental organizations and amendments to the law on freedom of faith in Azerbaijan, which is contradictory to the Azerbaijan’s commitments in the Council of Europe and damaging the fundamental freedoms. The standards of the Council of Europe based on the Convention on Human Rights. It means that the laws shouldn’t be contradictory to this Convention. We are also keeping the media situation in Azerbaijan in the focus of attention. Ago group welcomes the releasing of three journalists in April, but regrets that three journalists are still in jail. Azerbaijan needs to adopt the defamation law. Not only Ago group, but the Secretary General and Human Rights Commission also reacted to this issue for several times. Ago group hopes for positive steps in future. Ago group was first to support the project for improvement of journalistic professionalism in Azerbaijan. We are always keeping the media in the focus of our attention”.

/APA/