Azerbaijan closes two international NGOs

The Azerbaijani government has quietly stopped the operations of two international nongovernmental organizations in what some local observers claim is a further attempt to clamp down on the country’s relatively weak civil society.

The government, however, has countered that it is merely following the terms of its NGO registration requirements, EurasiaNet.org reported on its website.

The Baku offices of the Washington, DC-based, National Democratic Institute, or NDI, and the Oslo-based Human Rights House Network, or HRHN, last month both received written warnings from the Justice Ministry that they could not operate in Azerbaijan without official registration or, in the case of HRHN, meeting existing registration requirements.

Under 2009 amendments to Azerbaijan’s law on NGOs, a bilateral agreement between an NGO’s country of origin and the Azerbaijani government about the NGO’s operations in Azerbaijan is required for the organization’s registration.

NDI, which has operated in Azerbaijan since the mid-1990s, did not have registration at the time of its closure in mid-March; the organization, one of the most active in the South Caucasus for election monitoring and the training of various political parties, has been denied registration at least three times since 2006, said an NDI source who asked not to be named.

The Human Rights House Network, a popular meeting place for youth and human rights activists and journalists, has been registered in Azerbaijan since 2007. Despite that registration, the government is now demanding a bilateral agreement with Norway about the organization’s operations. Senior management from the NGO planned to visit Baku on April 19 to discuss the registration dispute with Justice Ministry officials.

Unlike HRHN, NDI has remained relatively tight-lipped with the media about the closure of its office; representatives referred reporters inquiring about the dispute to the U.S. embassy in Baku.

U.S. embassy spokesperson Keith Bean confirmed to EurasiaNet.org that police shut down the NDI office in Baku, but said negotiations were continuing with the government about reopening the office. NDI, however, has not yet renewed its application for registration with the ministry, Bean said.

The NDI source told EurasiaNet.org that armed police came to the NGO’s Baku office on March 7 shortly after the ministry handed over an official notice about its registration status and demanded that the staff shut down the office immediately. The office has since been closed and sealed, and the staff sent on leave, the source said.


/Hurriyet Daily News/