Thousands of opposition supporters rally in Azerbaijan’s capital
AIDA SULTANOVA

AP Worldstream; Jun 18, 2005

About 20,000 opposition protesters chanting “Freedom!” marched
across Azerbaijan’s capital Saturday, pushing for free parliamentary
elections this year and urging the government to step down in the
biggest protest in years.

The demonstration, the second such rally in as many weeks, was
organized by three leading opposition parties which formed the Azadlig
(Freedom) bloc to run for parliamentary elections set for November.

Tension has been building steadily in this oil-rich Caspian Sea nation
in the run-up to the elections, leading some observers to predict
that Azerbaijan could see a massive uprising similar to those that
toppled unpopular regimes in other ex-Soviet nations of Georgia,
Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan during the past 18 months.

Supporters of the Musavat party, the People’s Front of Azerbaijan
and the Democratic Party of Azerbaijan chanted “Freedom!” and “Free
Elections!” and carried pictures of U.S. President George W. Bush
with the words: “We want freedom!”

The opposition bloc has chosen orange as its campaign color _ the
color used by the Ukrainian opposition during mass protests dubbed
the “Orange Revolution” that helped pave way for the victory of a
Western-backed presidential candidate over a Russia-backed rival. Many
participants in Saturday’s rally wore orange T-shirts and baseball
caps and carried orange flags.

Several hundred followers of Ilgar Ibragimoglu, a dissident imam who
was evicted by the authorities from a mosque in the capital, joined
in the protest Saturday after reading a prayer.

The opposition demands election law reforms and access to
state-controlled television. The opposition parties have accused
authorities of rigging the October 2003 presidential election when
President Ilham Aliev succeeded his late father, Geidar Aliev, and
are demanding changes to prevent fraud in the parliamentary vote.

“People won’t tolerate election fraud,” Ali Kerimli, the leader of
the People’s Front of Azerbaijan, told the rally.

He and other speakers said a change in government is necessary to win
back control over Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed enclave that has been
under the control of Armenian separatists since the early 1990s.

“We are fighting against corruption and for the restoration of our
country’s territorial integrity,” said Arif Hajili, a Musavat party
leader.

The October 2003 election triggered clashes between police and
opposition demonstrators protesting vote-rigging, in which one person
died and nearly 200 were injured.

About 200 police in full riot gear stood guard Saturday around a
central square where protesters gathered. Brief scuffles erupted when
demonstrators tried to push police cordons away from the square and
officers fought back with truncheons.

Last month, police beat back opposition protesters who tried to hold
a banned rally in Baku and detained dozens of people.

Azerbaijan, a mostly Muslim country of 8.3 million, is the starting
point of the key pipeline that Washington says will reduce the United
States’ dependence on oil from the Middle East.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress