The Azerbaijanis who aren't feeling the Eurovision glow
The EBU, which puts on the kitsch music-fest, is mandated to protect freedom of expression. It should do so in Baku
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| A policeman detains an opposition activist in Baku … 'The European Broadcasting Union has to decide how it tackles the issue of Azerbaijan's awful human rights record.' |
We are only days away from our annual European dose of kitsch
and glamour delivered wonderfully by the Eurovision song contest, coming
this year to our living rooms from Baku, Azerbaijan on 26 May.
The
warm glow of European togetherness that the show usually generates, at
least for an evening, is one of the things the European Broadcasting
Union, the association of Europe's national public service broadcasters
that puts the contest on stage, loves most about it. The EBU regularly
reminds anyone listening that, particularly at such times of economic
strain in Europe, it's this music-fest, rather than worthy pan-European
political gestures from Brussels or elsewhere, that nudge us toward
loving this continent.
This year, the EBU has an extra challenge regarding Eurovision. It has to decide how it tackles the issue of Azerbaijan's awful human rights record
– not because it necessarily wants to but because activists in Baku and
elsewhere, plus media and some governments in Europe, have forced the
issue into the spotlight.
What has come to light? A terrible record on freedom of expression,
with six journalists in prison on spurious charges; several dozen
opposition political activists also behind bars, according to local
monitors; crackdowns on peaceful protests, most recently on Monday in the centre of Baku;
tight media controls creating a climate of fear in the country; and
physical violence against those saying things the country's
authoritarian government, led by President Ilham Aliyev, does not like.
One of the most recent victims was Idrak Abbasov,
a respected reporter. Last month he was filming forced evictions and
house demolitions by the country's state oil company when the firm's
security officials, along with police, viciously beat him unconscious,
leaving him hospitalised. Investigations into this and other cases are
half-hearted at best.
The EBU's core mandate,
of protecting and promoting the basic rights to freedom of expression,
might suggest it would use the Eurovision occasion to confront
Azerbaijan on its rights record. So far, however, it has very clearly
decided not to do so. This is a setback for journalists and others in
Azerbaijan standing up for freedom of speech, and a stance that the Baku
government can use to legitimise its actions. It's also not great PR
for the EBU itself.
For a media alliance that lives off freedom of
speech to ignore abuses of that freedom on the doorstep of the show's
sparkling seafront venue undercuts the organisation's own credibility.
The EBU has touched gingerly on freedom of expression in Azerbaijan in various statements, and on 2 May held a workshop in Geneva
on these issues aimed at promoting "dialogue" between the Azerbaijan
authorities, local and international pressure groups, and others.
Sadly,
despite EBU pledges of training sessions for journalists in Baku, the
organisation largely gave the senior Azerbaijan officials at the
workshop a free ride on the government's serious human rights abuses.
If
the EBU wants to engage seriously with a country such as Azerbaijan, it
has to get off the fence. Such regimes are often brutal and cunning,
and they need to face international pressure if they are to stop
limiting freedom of expression. In using the EBU's influence, platitudes
about more "dialogue", are not enough.
The EBU and its
members in 56 countries do have influence, and, on paper, high ethical
standards. The body boasts proudly of being "the largest association of
national broadcasters in the world", and in 2010 crafted a new
international declaration – after a conference in Baku, in fact –
"condemn[ing] arrests, harassment and intimidation of journalists" in
the EBU region and "call[ing] on governments to investigate all
instances of violence against journalists and bring to justice those
responsible".
So why so quiet on events on Azerbaijan? On
the six journalists in prison on trumped-up charges? On the journalists
severely beaten in recent months for doing their jobs? And on the
climate of fear that means self-censorship is pervasive?
Human Rights Watch
has, over the last nine months, used meetings and correspondence with
the EBU to explain the severity of conditions in Azerbaijan and the need
to speak out. We have asked the EBU to use its influence to raise
publicly the issue of imprisoned and harassed reporters, and to support
publicly the efforts by Baku's courageous civil society to organise
freedom of speech events in the week before Eurovision.
Such
steps would annoy Azerbaijan and, in our view, this is the reason the
EBU has refused. It argues that Eurovision is apolitical, and that such
issues should be raised on other occasions. But it also admits that, in
the show's 57-year history, it has never faced such a wave of
international concern about the human rights record of the host country
as it has this year.
The EBU still has some time to speak
out – and to get ready to monitor events after Eurovision, when the
international spotlight will have shifted but local journalists and
activists will be at their most vulnerable. Action now by the EBU would
be a good signal, also, on how it will handle future Eurovisions. As one
EBU official noted – what happens if Belarus wins on 26 May?
