In their joint report «On the death row, for eternity? », FIDH and HRCA had already called the attention of the international community on the situation of prisoners in Azerbaijan. The abolition of the death penalty in 1998 provoked a uncertainty as to the legal status of people on the death row. The law on the abolition automatically replaced the capital punishment by the life imprisonment, while the maximal punishment existing in the Criminal Code was 15 years of prison. The new Criminal Code adopted in 2000 failed to clarify this situation.
The conclusions of FIDH and HRCA fact-finding mission had contributed to the elaboration of Resolution N°1545 of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), which « urges the (Azerbaijani) authorities to ensure a case-by-case review of life sentences which were the result of the abolition of the death penalty and allow the persons concerned to benefit from the retroactive application of the most favourable criminal law provisions adopted in 2000 ». [1]
Nevertheless, the Constitutional court refused to examine the legality of the 1998 law, arguing that it lost its legal force in 2000.
The absence of perspective of the re-examination of life sentences leaves to the inmates only one possibility of protest : the hunger strikes. The current strike is the fifth massive hunger strike organized in Qobustan since 1999.
The strikers demand to apply the PACE Resolution N°1545, to ensure a case-by-case review of life sentences and to improve their conditions of detention. In Qobustan, the fundamental rights of convicts are not respected : bad sanitary conditions, unhealthy food, but also cruel treatments and torture and isolation from relatives make life in Azerbaijani prisons particularly harsh. In December 2006, a convict was burnt to death in Qobustan without anybody helping him or even noticing. The perturbed convicts are left without any medical aid and on 16 Juin 2007, a mentally perturbed detainee killed hit cellmate cutting off his throat. The high number of suicides in Qobustan prison shows that conditions of detention are particularly appealing.
FIDH and HRCA call upon the Azerbaijani authorities to proceed with the necessary reforms to improve the conditions of detention of the prisoners, notably by implementing recommendations by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and the UN Committee against the torture.
FIDH and HRCA urge the Azerbaijani authorities to implement the recommendations included in the PACE Resolution N°1545 and to ensure a case-by-case review of life sentences.