Gurban Mammadov
Gurban Mammadov ( (also Məmmədli); born April 2, 1959) is an Azerbaijani politician. He was born in the village of Jahri (Azerb.: Cəhri) of Babek (Azerb.: Babək) district of Nakhchivan (Azerb.: Azərbaycan) Autonomous Republic. He went to school in Ordubad. In 1987, he graduated from Azerbaijan State University. He got involved with politics during university years. After graduation, he worked as a Lawyer for 35 years and heavily influenced Azerbaijani politics. He is very well known for being an outspoken politician and never being afraid of government. Life. Mr Mammadov also one of the famous people in Azerbaijan, who  helped to form the political movement back in the 1980s to 1990s, was a very close friend and supporter of the first legal / elected president of Azerbaijan - Abulfaz Elchibey. Mr Mammadov also helped him during his presidency and provided the necessary support required to form the constitution and legal system of Azerbaijan. He founded an independent newspaper known as "HURRIYYET" and was CEO from 1990 until 2003. Politics. A well-known lawyer in Azerbaijan, Mammadov dealt with human rights cases as the head of Chalkhan LLC, and as an independent attorney. As of early 2013, Mammadov began to seriously criticize  the ruling regime and its policies, and became a member of the National Council, a coalition of opposition parties and civil society organizations, formed ahead of the October 2013 presidential election. Mammadov was accused of causing an automobile accident in 2012 that resulted in an injury to a parking lot guard. Mammadov was sentenced to pre-trial detention without sufficient cause. In the third month of his detention, another charge was brought against him. On 6 December 2013, Nasimi District Court sentenced Mammadov to three years in prison. Although all testimonies and evidence including the evidence collected by investigation officers  proved Mammadov’s innocence, the court ruling was solely based on the testimony of former police officer, Isa Mansurov, one of the case witnesses. Mansurov claimed that Mammadov’s car had run over the guard’s foot. But when questioned by the lawyers and Mammadov about the accident, he gave answers such as “I don’t remember.” The court refused to look at the footage recorded by surveillance camera No. TS3-098, which was three or four meters away from the scene of the accident. The court also refused to investigate other circumstances that could have impacted the case. Although  none of the articles Mammadov was charged with carrying three-year prison sentences, the court granted the public prosecutor’s request for this duration. It is not the first politically motivated arrest of Mr Gurban Mammadov. Previously, he was arrested in 1998 and charged with allegations that he plotted the so-called "assassination" of the president Haydar Aliyev, was sentenced to 5 years in prison. Azerbaijan's president approves amnesty for 87 prisoners on 29 December 2014 and Mr Gurban Mammadov is among them. Mr Mammadov was released from prison on 30 December 2014. On the 2 April 2018, Mr  Gurban Mammadov fled Azerbaijan because of an imminent threat to his life and arrived in the United Kingdom with a five-year family (private) visa which he obtained a year earlier. He claimed asylum in May the same year once he made a visit to Turkey to meet his wife, receiving a death threat message sent to him via his wife he made the decision to immediately return to the UK and apply for asylum. He was granted full protection on grounds of European Convention on Human Rights and UNHCR - The 1951 Refugee Convention) in 2018, October. Presently Mr Gurban  Mammadov living in the United Kingdom. He is the founder of an online television/media group called: "AzerFreedomTV", which he started back in 2011 but actively managing since May 2018, from the United Kingdom. He is live on nine different social media platforms daily since May 2018 and heavily influenced the Azerbaijan political environment. In early September 2020, the demolition of the building, made of two offices on the ground floor and three flats above, one of them belonging to Mr Gurban Mammadov and others to his daughters, Gunel Mammadova and Turan Hagverdiyeva, were declared illegal by some unknown people  came to the site with up to 30 workers of the local authority, none of them produced identification about who they are and they were accompanied by official police officers, also making no comment about their orders (where local authorities couldn't produce a court order for doing so still to date), located at 4-6 Murtuza Nagiyev Street, Narimanov District of Baku, began. All items within the building, which consisted of various items and houses, were savagely destroyed & looted, while there were 5 under the 10 kids in those apartments at the time of the vandalism. According to Azerbaijani  media, the single block building containing 2 offices & 3 flats were given to Gurban Mammadov by the head of the Narimanov District Executive Power Abdin Farzaliyev at the request of the former head of the Presidential Administration Ramiz Mehdiyev and the former head of the department Ali Hasanov. Furthermore, two correspondents of the Turan Information Agency were detained and interrogated for taking photos and filming, which were prohibited in the area. There are many video materials on YouTube & Facebook clearly showing the destruction they've caused. On September 8, 2020, the Prosecutor General's Office of the Republic of Azerbaijan  made a decision on declaring Gurban Mammadov internationally wanted and sent the order to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the State Security Service, as well as the Interpol for execution. He will be sentenced to up to eight years in prison if detained by the Azerbaijani law enforcement agencies. On March 30th, 2021 US State Department has released its "2020 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Azerbaijan" report and in the category of "POLITICALLY MOTIVATED REPRISAL AGAINST INDIVIDUALS LOCATED OUTSIDE THE COUNTRY" Mr Gurban Mammadov's name is listed as one of the main people who is targeted by Azerbaijani  authorities, by creating false criminal cases, which aims at "to detain foreign residents who were activists". Family. Mammadov is married and has five children: