An Azerbaijani journalist and writer known for his criticism of the governments in Baku and Tehran has died four days after a brutal stabbing attack.

Rafiq Tağı was stabbed seven times outside his Baku home on 19 November, according to various news sources.  He was transported to a hospital and had been recovering from what had been an apparently successful surgery when hospital officials announced his death.

While no suspects have been named in the attack, Mr. Tağı speculated to the media while in the hospital that he had been targeted for an opinion piece critical of the Iranian government that he had written earlier this month, Radio Free Europe/Liberty reported.

Mr. Tağı had long been at odds with the Iranian government.  After Mr. Tağı wrote an article called “Europe and Us” that appeared in the Azerbaijani newspaper Senet in 2006, an Iranian Grand Ayatollah issued a fatwa for Mr. Tağı and Senet’s publisher, Samir Sadagatoğlu, accusing the two men of insulting Islam and calling for their deaths.  At least one Iranian newspaper appears to have welcomed Mr. Tağı’s death: the conservative Jomhouri Islami today called Mr. Tağı the ‘Azeri Salman Rushdie’—in reference to the Indian novelist similarly subject to an Iranian fatwa—and said Mr. Tağı had been ‘hated by the people’, Iran’s Independent News Service reported.

In 2007, an Azerbaijani court sentenced Mr. Tağı to four years in prison for ‘inciting religious hatred’ after the publication of “Europe and Us.”  He was released one year later after international pressure mounted on the government of President Ilham Aliyev.

The International Press Institute (IPI) is outraged by the attack on Mr. Tağı and deeply distressed to hear of his death. IPI Press Freedom Manager Anthony Mills said: “While we do not yet have all the facts, given the climate in which journalists must operate in Azerbaijan and Iran we cannot help but suspect that Mr. Tağı was attacked in retaliation for his writing.  We send our deepest condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of Mr. Tağı and we call upon the Azerbaijani authorities to immediately begin a thorough and transparent investigation into Mr. Tağı’s murder.”

IPI Azerbaijan National Committee Chairperson and Chair of the International Eurasia Press Fund (IEPF) Umud Mirzayev said, “I’m greatly grieved by the death of Rafiq. It is sad when a colleague, a journalist is killed. I would like to join my voice to those of numerous others to call for quick apprehension of those who perpetuated this wicked act, and they must face the law and be brought to justice”

Mr. Mirzayev was present at the hospital after learning of Mr. Tağı’s death and was to attend the journalist’s funeral today on behalf of IPI and IEPF.

IPI is deeply troubled by the worsening situation of press freedom in Azerbaijan and in particular by the high degree of impunity for crimes against journalists.  In places where impunity is allowed to thrive, attacks on journalists increase, a trend highlighted by IPI’s recent joint conference with the Austrian Foreign Ministry on impunity and journalist safety.