AZERBAIJAN: Conscientious objector jailing “very unexpected decision”

On 22 September, a Goranboy court jailed 22-year-old Jehovah’s Witness Seymur Mammadov for nine months for refusing compulsory military service on conscientious grounds. On 25 July – two days after his 18th birthday – officers seized conscientious objector Royal Karimov and forcibly took him to a military unit in Ganca, where he is still held. Baku’s Sabail District Court extended to March 2023 the pre-trial detention of Shia Muslim Imam Sardar Babayev, held on treason charges since October 2021, Babayev’s lawyer Javad Javadov told Forum 18.