Azerbaijan’s ruler fails to buy internet friends

09 Nov 12 | Digital Freedom, Europe and Central Asia

The fact that Azerbaijan is hosting the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) may seem incongruous to many, not least Emin Milli and Adnan Hajizadeh, who in 2009 were jailed for 14 months ostensibly for disseminating a satirical video remarking on the suspiciously high price the government paid to import donkeys. However, the General Secretary of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU — a specialised UN agency that sets standards for international telephony) has thought about this carefully. Remarking on the role that social networks can play in the strengthening freedoms, Hamadoun Toure said:

The fact of 1 million Facebook users in Azerbaijan shows that the country is among the world leaders in this field.

Perhaps it is too easy to respond to these comments, breathlessly trumpeted in the state media, with a quick check on what Saudi Arabia‘s 5.8 million Facebook users might indicate for freedom in that country. When I was in Baku, one blogger told me that the internet in Azerbaijan is relatively open (at least to those with access, penetration remains low outside the cities), sites are not blocked and the authorities would encourage everyone to say everything online with the unfortunate caveat that it is all recorded and you may pay for your expression with a late night knock at door, your career terminated, or worse.

A Eurovision protest is crushed in Baku

These claims further demonstrate the Aliyev regime’s frustrating insistence on organising international events and thus opening up the country to examination, only to be baffled when not everyone is happy at the host’s questionable activities. In May 2012, Azerbaijan spent untold amounts of its oil profits on throwing a lavish Eurovision Song Contest only for party-pooping journalists and activists to kill the mood by publishing images of beaten protesters, impoverished citizens and the smoking ruins of houses bulldozed to make way for the Eurovision arena Crystal Hall. After the contest had finished and the circus had left town, presidential spokesman Ali Hasanov departed from the cuddly Eurovision script to recommend that “public hatred” should be directed towards the independent media that brought these issues to light.

Like other eccentric, lonely billionaires, president Ilham Aliyev seems to think that ostentatious displays of wealth lead to happiness. Azerbaijan’s money actually could buy happiness for the population if directed in the right way but instead it is lost in a black hole of corruption or funnelled into curious white elephant projects, culminating recently in the most audacious to date: a statue of former leader Heydar Aliyev in a park in Mexico City. Meanwhile the President’s children are blessed with multi-million dollar property portfolios, and the majority of Azerbaijanis struggle along.

My experience as a foreign journalist in Azerbaijan during Eurovision was bizarre from the moment I stepped off the plane. After being welcomed by some friendly young volunteers I was shepherded on to a large coach with Eurovision logos emblazoned on the side in which I was the sole passenger. I spent part of the journey along Heydar Aliyev Avenue, admiring the ubiquitous Heydar Aliyev posters and wondering why a large fence had been erected either side of the motorway. Some Azeribaijanis dryly termed this the “belt of happiness”, as it was clearly a flagrant attempt to conceal the sprawl of ramshackle houses beyond it.

The belt of happiness provides a useful metaphor of the Azerbaijani government’s constant clumsy attempts to conceal deep problems in the country with a gold sticker and hope that visiting observers and investors will not notice. The act of hosting the IGF does not mark you out as a pioneer of freedom any more than building a statue in Mexico endears you to Mexicans. Such moves can be used to fuel the gargantuan PR machine that says Azerbaijan is a stable, open-minded country to do business with, when in fact bribery and financial chicanery are endemic and teenagers are arrested for shouting the word freedom on the streets. However, Azerbaijan must be encouraged in its unquenchable thirst for partying and events if only to attract increased scrutiny to yet another repressive regime that exchanges oil for the silence of European politicians.

More on this story:

Azerbaijan-access-denied

Learn more on Azerbaijan‘s human rights situation on our Azerbaijan: Access Denied page

Running scared: Azerbaijan’s silenced voices, a report on freedom of expression by the International Partnership Group for Azerbaijan

From Baku: Voices for internet freedom

08 Nov 12 | Digital Freedom, Uncategorized

The Baku Expo Centre is a fairly bland setting for the Internet Governance Forum 2012 — even if the choice of Azerbaijan as host is not —  but debates, discussions and overlapping conversations are lively, pointed, sometimes heated with voices from politics, business, activists, academics, officials around the world arguing about our digital world.

One thing is clear in this melee: a big international debate on how — and whether — we keep the internet free is under way, and there is a lot of support for the sort of bottom up, diverse, varied debate (or in techno-speak “multistakeholder governance model”) the IGF is part of.

Here’s a flavour of some of the views and debates of the first two days.

A common starting point at the IGF has been that offline rights must apply equally online. But views diverge rapidly on whether access to the internet is or should be a human right. “No,” says a lawyer, jumping to his feet, “we cannot defend that in court”; “yes” is the riposte from a senior Kenyan official, adding that “as more people in Kenya use mobiles for simple money transfers, lack of access to such a service would block many people from normal economic activities as well as from wider information and debates.”

Switch to another session and a Council of Europe official is arguing — strangely — that we probably cannot avoid population-wide databases on our digital comms, so we must control who has access and how. A speaker from India in a subsequent session disagrees strongly calling such big data projects “a big catastrophe”.

Azerbaijani writer, Emin Milli explains that in Azerbaijan you can freely write on Twitter or Facebook, but the problem is what happens afterwards. The regime targets writers and bloggers with the aim of creating more widespread intimidation and self-censorship — online and offline censorship intertwine.

 

EU MEP Marietje Schaake talks of “cat and mouse” games between states pushing for security — and repression — and of activists creatively finding ways to assert their freedom and rights. She calls for export controls on digital surveillance technology as a priority and urges the EU to develop a full digital strategy that can be applied to its external policies.

In yet another session, the need for anonymity online is debated and strongly defended with the chairman summing up by saying that “protection of anonymity is an absolute priority and ISPs (Internet Service Providers) must go as far as possible to defend it.”

As I head off to join a panel on cyber security, privacy and openness, I am sure I will encounter a range of views including some passionate disagreements. But I know too that many, if not all, of these voices will be arguing about how to keep and promote our internet freedom — and if we can build this debate and these networks, then we can stand up to those who are acting both openly and covertly to undermine those freedoms.

Kirsty Hughes is Chief Executive of Index on Censorship