YEREVAN, MARCH 17, ARMENPRESS. The official website of the Azeri Presidential administration, www.president.az, underwent some changes on March 16, ahead of the country’s elections, the Azerbaijani Azadliq news agency reported.

Online visitors are now enabled to write letters to the Azeri president, but the reason behind this “innovation” is rather something else. Numerous praise letters dated back since March 7 addressed to the country’s president were uploaded to the website.

According to Azadliq, most of the letters were written at the order of the president himself, and the authors of the praise letters are Aliyev’s staff members.

In many cases the content of the letters is the same.

Incumbent President Ilham Aliyev, who is running for another term in office in the upcoming April 11 elections, is actively campaigning to attract voters. The authoritarian leader of Azerbaijan is even using state budget resources to attract as many votes as possible, recently even raising public sector salaries and pensions, which is something the domestic economy cannot handle.

Earlier in February the Azeri president ordered snap elections on April 11.

English –translator/editor: Stepan Kocharyan