A court in Azerbaijan’s Baku district of Garadag has sentenced opposition journalist Eynulla Fatullayev to an additional 30 months in prison. The journalist, who has been imprisoned since April 2007, was found guilty of illegal possession of narcotics, a charge based on small amounts of heroin which were allegedly found in his clothes in December of last year during a search of his prison cell.

“This decision, while hardly unexpected, is further evidence of the government’s intolerance of criticism,” said IPI Director David Dadge. “The European Court of Human Rights has already called for Fatullayev’s release, and the Azeri government’s insistence on keeping Fatullayev in prison reinforces Azerbaijan’s complete disregard for the European Convention on Human Rights to which it is a party.”

In an email to IPI, Umud Mirzayev, Chairperson of the IPI National Committee in Azerbaijan condemned the decision of the court, “because we were looking for a positive outcome. The journalism community in Azerbaijan was thinking the European court judgment would influence the outcome of this present judgment. We hope the case would be reviewed and a just verdict would be given.”

The European Court of Human Rights on 22 April ruled six to one that Azerbaijan had violated Fatullayev’s rights, and had “grossly” and “disproportionately” restricted freedom of expression by imprisoning him. According to a statement on the Court’s website, the judgment recalled that “freedom of information applied not only to information or ideas that were favorably received, but also to those that offended, shocked or disturbed.”

The Court also ordered Azerbaijan to pay the journalist 27,822 Euros in damages and expenses.

Fatullayev, the founder and editor-in-chief of the newspapers Gündəlik Azərbaycan, and Realny Azerbaijan, was imprisoned in 2007 on charges of criminal defamation relating to an article he had written in 2005. Later the same year, the Azeri government argued that another article he had written in March 2007 constituted a threat of terrorism. Fatullayev was found guilty on both counts, and sentenced to a total of eight-and-a-half years in prison.

In December 2009, 0.223 grams of heroin were found on Fatullayev. The journalist was placed under investigation for the illegal possession of drugs – a charge many believe was fabricated to prevent his release in the likely event that the ECHR found in his favor.

Incidents of judicial harassment against Fatullayev date as far back as 2000, during his time as an editor at the Milletin Sesi and Monitor publications. By 2001, Fatullayev was already facing several lawsuits related to articles he had written, and in both 2002 and 2003 he was found guilty of criminal defamation and fined for articles he had written criticising the government.

Pressure increased on Fatullayev following the murder of his journalist colleague Elmar Huseynov in 2005. Fatullayev investigated and reported on financial links between the Interior Minister, Ramil Usubov, and a former public official believed by some to have been involved in Huseynov’s murder. Usubov launched criminal defamation charges against Fatullayev under articles 147(2) and 148 of the Azeri criminal code in 2006, and Fatullayev received a two-year suspended sentence and was ordered to pay US$ 11,500 in damages.

Both Realny Azerbaijan and the Gundalik Azarbaycan are no longer in print. The premises of both newspapers were raided by the authorities, the staff interrogated and evicted, and all computers confiscated.

IPI has long campaigned for Fatullayev’s release, through its Justice Denied Campaign, which draws attention to the plight of journalists imprisoned or harassed for their work.