Muslim-majority country after Egypt to have operas
Do u really see this as a source of pride that you as a Shia Muslim nation who deprived from its basic human rights (religion) by CCCP and were first or second to become secular or having operas!! We Shias of Iran both patriot and nationalist and surely independent and have our own history, identity, culture, music, theater, etc... It is very low class for a non-Western nation to feel low and start to absorb Western culture as if it is a source of pride!! I wonder why Muslim nations never absorb discipline, hard work, science and research from West!!
When you call Az republic a Democratic country I have no choice but to suspect my eyes! Come on... the whole world knows this fact... A president that is by chance the son of last president and was appointed as head of the national oil company by chance and always wins presidential elections by nearly %90 absolute win ratio!!
Maybe becoz you are under heavy Aliev propaganda in Az republic you find it unlikely but take your time for minutes and read below (although it does not need sources as it is so clear and known):
Ilham Aliyev - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Political career[edit]
Early years[edit]
In May or June 1994, Ilham Aliyev was appointed vice-president of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR). He participated as one of the key figures during the negotiations between Azerbaijani government and Western oil companies during the conclusion of new contracts now known as
Contract of the century. The following year Aliyev was elected to the
National Assembly of Azerbaijanand later became president of the National Olympic Committee (still incumbent) and head of the Azerbaijan delegation to the
Council of Europe. In August 2003, two months prior to the presidential elections, he was appointed prime minister.[2] In October that year, Heydar Aliyev, suffering failing health, stepped down as president.[3]
2003 election[edit]
Main article:
Azerbaijani presidential election, 2003
The official results of the October 15, 2003,
elections gave victory to Ilham Aliyev, who earned 76.84% of the votes.
[4]
Protests were staged in Azerbaijan to dispute the results, and
the elections received criticism from the international community, with many observers noting that they fell short of international standards and were accompanied by
voter intimidation, unequal campaign opportunities for the candidates, and widespread violations of the electoral laws and process. Some
members of the opposition were arrested in conjunction with the protests, but were later released.
[5] The
OSCE International Election Observation Mission noted a number of irregularities in the counting and tabulation.
[6]Human Rights Watch complained that Aliyev's election campaign had been supported by government resources and that the Central Election Commission and local election commissions had been stacked with its supporters, while local non-governmental organizations had been banned from monitoring the vote.
[7] According to
Freedom House.
Aliyev with the President of Russia
Dmitry Medvedev, 3 July 2008
2008 election[edit]
Ilham Aliyev was re-elected in 2008 with 87% of the polls, while opposition parties boycotted the elections.
In a constitutional referendum in 2009, term limits for the presidency were abolished and freedom of the press was restricted.
In 2009, following his reelection as president, Aliyev passed a referendum which removed the presidential consecutive term limit, thereby allowing him to run for president as many times as he wishes. Opposition claimed this to be a violation of the Azerbaijani constitution and the European convention on human rights.[9]
The
2010 parliamentary elections produced a Parliament completely loyal to Aliyev: for the first time in Azerbaijani history, not a single candidate from the main opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front or
Musavat parties was elected.
The Economist subsequently scored
Azerbaijan as an
authoritarian regime, at 140th place (out of 167) in its 2011
Democracy Index.
[10]
Repeated protests were staged against Aliyev's rule in 2011, calling for more democracy and the ouster of the government. Aliyev has responded by ordering a security crackdown, using force to crush attempts at revolt in
Baku. Officials loyal to the president have dismissed protesters' comparison of Azerbaijan to
other countries considered to be part of the same
revolutionary wave that has rocked
North Africa and
Western Asia since December 2010, and Aliyev has rejected the precedent set by leaders in
Armenia,
Oman,
Jordan, and other affected states by refusing to make concessions. Well over 400 Azerbaijanis have been arrested since protests began in March 2011.
[11] Opposition leaders, including Musavat's
Isa Gambar, have vowed to continue demonstrating, although police have encountered little difficulty in stopping protests almost as soon as they begin.
[12] As president, Aliyev earns a salary of close to $230,000 a year. Amnesty International in its Media Briefing of 2012 reported that the "crackdown on the free speech has intensified in recent years". The report highlighted that "In Azerbaijan, people who exercise this fundamental right [freedom of speech] to criticise President Ilham Aliyev, his family or government, risk being threatened, attacked or imprisoned – whether they do so on- or off-line".
[13]
2013 election[edit]
The presidential elections were held on 9 October 2013.
Aliyev won with 85 percent of the vote, securing a third five-year term.
[14] A day before voting began, a smartphone application run by the Central Election Commission showed Aliyev winning the election with 72.76 percent of the vote, suggesting that
the election results were prefabricated. Azerbaijani officials claimed the results were those of the 2008 election, yet the candidates listed were from the 2013 ballot.
[15] Aliyev's main rivals in the election were
Jamil Hasanli and Igbal Agazade.
In 2013, Ilham Aliyev faced criticism from the
United States and
Amnesty International for election 'irregularities' along with crackdowns against journalists and opposition activists, including the jailing of election monitors.
[16]
Ilham Aliyev's image remains largely controversial. He has been criticized for his authoritarian rule[17][18][19] and sometimes described as the head of corruption in Europe by analysts and political commentators.[20][21][22][23][24][25] Aliyev's government has been listed as one of the most corrupt in Europe by Transparency International.[26][27]
Party affiliations and foreign relations[edit]
On March 26, 2005, Aliyev was officially elected as the ruling New Azerbaijan Party chairman. The opposition denounced this as a violation of state laws, because according to the law on political parties, the president should have no party affiliation.
In April 2006, President Aliyev made a state visit to Washington, D.C. It was a remarkably successful trip, at least in terms of image. Speaking at a public forum sponsored by the prestigious Council on Foreign Relations, Aliyev discussed oil, economic development, and democracy with an audience of reporters and others. The visit was capped with a private meeting in the White House with President George W. Bush, who told reporters that their discussion was "really interesting", although he also said the meeting was "candid" – sometimes a code word for "tense". Opposition groups said that an official meeting with President Bush sent an inappropriate signal that the violence and intimidation of the 2005 parliamentary election was now a closed matter.
[28]
Controversies[edit]
WikiLeaks[edit]
In 2010,
WikiLeaks uncovered a diplomatic cable dispatched by the US Embassy in the Republic of Azerbaijan, part of the cache of documents obtained by the WikiLeaks website, that explicitly compared
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to a mafia crime boss, leaving many to wonder if his government was actually democratic and whether people truthfully believed that Azerbaijan does not repress minority populations.
[29] A number of groups have also complained to the Commission on Human Rights for the purpose of adopting a resolution, which urges Azerbaijan to guarantee the preservation of the cultural, religious and national identity of the Talysh people in light of repeated claims of repression.
[30]
Ramil Safarov repatriation[edit]
In 2012, Aliyev convinced the government of
Hungary to transfer convicted murderer
Ramil Safarov to Azerbaijan to complete the rest of his prison term. While attending a NATO-sponsored English-language course in Hungary, Safarov had murdered an Armenian lieutenant who was also taking the course,
Gurgen Margaryan, while Margaryan was asleep. Safarov had been tried and sentenced to life imprisonment in Hungary. However, after being extradited to Azerbaijan, Safarov received a hero's welcome; he was promoted to the rank of major, and given an apartment and over eight years of back pay, covering the time he had spent in jail.
[31][32]
Statements about Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh[edit]
Aliyev has been cited as calling all
Armenian people in the world as the enemies of Azerbaijan,
[33][34][35] and as regularly threatening to take over the disputed region of
Nagorno-Karabakh and the entire Armenian Republic through military force.
[36][37][38]
In 2008, Aliyev declared that “
Nagorno Karabakh will never be independent; the position is backed by international mediators as well; Armenia has to accept the reality" and that "in 1918,
Yerevan was granted to the
Armenians. It was a great mistake. The
khanate of Iravan was the
Azeri territory, the Armenians were guests there."
[39]
Corruption[edit]
Aliyev with
his wife during their visit to
Poland.
In 2012 the
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) named Ilham Aliyev Person of the Year (a title bestowed for figuring prominently in 2012 on stories on crime and corruption) after "well-documented evidence" revealed that "his family has secret ownership stakes in the country’s largest businesses including bank, construction companies, gold mines and phone companies".
[40]According to ICIJ latest report, Aliyev's family has been a shareholder of big offshore companies.
[41] As reported by
The Washington Postand
Mail Online, Aliyev's two daughters share a property portfolio of about £50 million – across Dubai, Paris and London and Aliyev's 11-year-old son in Dubai owns "nine waterfront mansions" with a total price of "about $44 million – or roughly 10,000 years' worth of salary for the average citizen of Azerbaijan".
[42][43][44][45]
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Aliyev’s dictatorship is threat to regional and global stability | TheHill
Azerbaijani President Aliyev Named Corruption's 'Person Of The Year'
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/12/opinion/the-two-faces-of-azerbaijans-mr-aliyev.html?_r=0
As Conflict Escalates, Dictator Ilham Aliyev Needs to Be Stopped | Christopher Atamian
Inside the court of Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev | Covcas bulletin
Prince Andrew's 'close friendship' with 'torture' dictator Ilham Aliyev | Daily Mail Online
Azerbaijan: The pipeline that would fuel a dictator | Red Pepper
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