Amal Clooney fights Azerbaijan in EHCR and denies Azerbaijani frauds about her Armenian roots

YEREVAN, MARCH 16, ARMENPRESS. Famed international rights lawyer Amal Clooney says Azerbaijan is abusing its power by trying to silence critics of the regime, including imprisoned reporter Khadija Ismayilova. “Armenpress” reports, citing Radio Liberty.

Clooney, who is helping represent Ismayilova before Europe's top human rights court, also said that the case against Ismayilova was wholly politically motivated, aimed at keeping her from continuing her corruption investigations of President Ilham Aliyev and his family members.

"I believe it's important to protect an individual journalist against a powerful state that has overstepped. This is about a government that is abusing its power to silence journalists like Khadija, as well as other critics of the ruling regime," Clooney told RFE/RL in an e-mail conversation on March 15.

"It's important to fight for the right of journalists to tell the world what is happening in their countries," she said.

Ismayilova, a renowned investigative reporter and regular contributor to RFE/RL, was arrested in Baku in December 2014 and put on trial on charges that her supporters said were politically motivated.

In September, a Baku court sentenced her to 7 1/2 years in prison, a ruling that prompted international criticism.

Clooney confirmed in January that she would be joining Ismayilova's defense, a move that brings substantial legal and public clout to her case.

In the case she is bringing before the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), Clooney told RFE/RL that she and her co-counsel were arguing that there was no genuine suspicion that Ismayilova committed any of the crimes she was charged with and that there was no justification for her pretrial detention.

"On the contrary, the case involved a politically motivated prosecution to restrict her freedom of speech," she said.

"Khadija's case is emblematic of a wider crackdown on journalists and human rights defenders in Azerbaijan," she said. "Azerbaijan has one of the highest rates of imprisonment of journalists in the world, and yet this is a country that is a member of the Council of Europe, an organization whose goal is to promote human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. This is something that should concern us all."

Supporters of the Aliyev regime have repeatedly tried to smear Ismayilova, including circulating secret surveillance video of her.

Top government officials have also attacked Clooney with spurious allegations that she is of Armenian descent. Clooney, who holds dual British and Lebanese citizenship, again rejected the label.

"I don't see how belonging to any nation, whatever it is, would discredit me in any way. As it happens my heritage is not Armenian, but I do not see why this should matter," said Clooney, who has been involved in several high-profile cases around the world, including the defense of a Canadian journalist for Al-Jazeera and an ECHR case in whichshe represented Armenia.