OSCE Urges Democracy In Azerbaijan Amid Persecution Of Christians

Azerbaijan on Tuesday, March 16, not to "misled" children "with propaganda" and to overcome the scars of post-Communist ethnic conflicts amid international concern over continuous violations of religious rights of Christians and other minority groups in the region.

The OCSE’s Chairman-in-Office, Bulgarian Foreign Minister Solomon Passy said he realized progress has been slow in Azerbaijan’s volatile region of Nagorno-Karabakh, where a majority of the people are Armenian Christians.

He urged both Azerbaijan and Armenia, which occupied 20 percent of the region since 1992, to invest in accurate and objective history books. "We must invest in the education of the next generation," Passy said. "If we allow our children to be misled by propaganda, the next generation will find it hard to be objective and walk away from old scars."

Passy also asked the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, about the arrest of his opponents in October last year, following controversial presidential elections. Human rights groups have accused him of running a restrictive Islamic republic, where there have been fresh reports of attacks against Christians.

EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS

Forum 18, an Oslo based religious rights group, has especially expressed concern about the situation of Evangelical Christians, including Adventists, in areas such as the Naxçivan Autonomous Republic, an Azerbaijani exclave cut off from the rest of the country by Armenian territory.

News emerged this month that among those suffering is Adventist pastor Khalid Babaev and his family, who were forced to flee the region in fear after police refused to protect them from serious death threats, Forum 18 News Service (F18News) said.

It is believed the threats were related to the commemoration by Shia Muslims of the martyrdom of Imam Husayn, grandson of Islam’s prophet Muhammad, which is often a tense time, the news agency added.

In mid-February the Babaev family first received threats from a telephone caller who did not give his name. The same caller rang again on February 24, repeating the threats "with obscene words" and "I will come and take your soul!" Babaev quoted him as shouting. "I will gather a crowd and drag you from here,!" the caller allegedly said.

MOB THREAT

After another threatening call that evening five men – one of whom introduced himself as a driver named Jamil appeared at the gate of Babaev’s house the next day threatened to gather a mob of people to kill him or drive him out, F18News claimed.

Police reportedly refused to help Babaev or accept a statement from him about the threats. They also are said to have refused to discuss the threats with the Forum 18 religious rights group. Babaev, who is the second pastor to be forced out from the region in recent years, has suggested the authorities want to strangle the small Adventist community who have no place to worship.

A previous pastor of Naxçivan’s Adventist church, Vahid Nagiev, was deported with his family from the exclave in June 2002, although Azerbaijani law has no provisions for internal deportation, F18News said. The Naxçivan church, like many Protestant congregations across Azerbaijan, has been denied state registration, reported the news agency.