Azerbaijani authorities have arrested an opposition newspaper editor following a Parliament member’s claim that the editor demanded more than €9,200 from her to avoid the release of compromising information.

Local media reported that authorities detained Khural Chief Editor Avaz Zeynalli Friday on blackmail and extortion charges under a court order allowing them to hold him for up to three months while they investigate pro-government lawmaker Gular Akhmedova’s accusation.

Zeynalli has denied the claim, reportedly maintaining that he only spoke with Akhmedova after she made repeated attempts to contact him through intermediaries. He said that Akhmedova offered him money in exchange for loyalty to the authorities.

The journalist also, in a television interview shortly before his arrest, said that he and his newspaper had been targeted for pressure by authorities based on his criticism of President Ilham Aliyev.

IPI Press Freedom & Communications Manager Anthony Mills said: “We are extremely concerned about Mr. Zeynalli’s arrest and we call on the government to make public immediately any evidence in support of its allegations against him. Unfortunately, this is only the latest in a litany of instances of harassment directed at journalists in Azerbaijan who face a real climate of intimidation. That climate apparently did not end with the government’s release of Eynulla Fatullayev and it can be witnessed in an attack a few months ago on American journalist Amanda Erickson and British human rights activist Celia Davies Carys, which reportedly occurred shortly before the two were scheduled to meet with Mr. Fatullayev in Baku following his release.”

Zeynalli’s detention follows a raid last month in which court officers entered the newspaper’s offices and seized its property for failing to pay fines ordered in a defamation lawsuit brought by presidential administration head Ramiz Mehtiyev and others.

A court last year awarded Mehtiyev and Vugar Safarli, head of the president’s media support office, approximately €9,200 and €4,600, respectively. The journalist has maintained that the newspaper lacked sufficient funds to pay the fines, but the Ministry of Justice last week initiated criminal charges against him for contempt for failing to pay.

Mehtiyev sued Zeynalli over an article that accused Mehtiyev of preventing a well-known poet from participating in a 2000 election and of attempting to link the poet to subsequent protests. Safarli sued over an article that accused him of helping Aliyev to try to squelch independent media.