Azerbaijan Silences Free Radio Stations

Azerbaijan's National Television and Radio Council has ruled that it will ban international radio stations from broadcasting on national frequencies.

The ban, which is due to come into effect on January 1, will terminate radio broadcasts by the BBC, Voice of America, and RFE/RL's Azeri-language service, Radio Azadliq. A fourth station, Russia's Evropa Plus, is reportedly facing the same ban.

The council first announced the proposal in late October, but today's ruling finalizes the decision.

The council has argued that national FM and medium-wave radio frequencies are the property of the government, and as such cannot be used by international broadcasters.

The decision is seen as cutting off one of the last remaining sources of independent news and information in Azerbaijan.

Speaking in Prague, RFE/RL President Jeffrey Gedmin said the decision was regrettable and "deeply disappointing."

"We are known there as a source of independent, credible, accurate news and information," Gedmin said. "This decision to knock us off the air and, by the way, others -- the Voice of America, the BBC -- is going to rob the people in this country of important information that they need to react and act on as they're leading their lives and trying to grow and build civil society."

Crumbling Press Freedom

Although the banned broadcasters will still have access to satellite, cable, and Internet platforms in Azerbaijan, the ban on radio transmissions is expected to eliminate the vast majority of the stations' current audience.

RFE/RL's Azeri-language Radio Azadliq, for example, is expected to lose approximately 95 percent of its audience due to the ban.

Television and radio remain the primary source of information in Azerbaijan, where access to print media and the Internet is limited. There are no independent local broadcasters in Azerbaijan.

Media-watchers say the move is further evidence of crumbling press freedom in the oil-rich Caspian Sea nation.

Miklos Haraszti, the media-freedom representative for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, told RFE/RL the move would have a chilling effect on the few independent journalists still remaining in Azerbaijan.

"It is especially regrettable, given that in Azerbaijan we have seen a deterioration in the security of journalists due to harassment," Haraszti said. "Many so-called criminal cases have been orchestrated by the prosecutors against independent-minded print media and their editors and journalists. Many of them are even in prison."

"With this decision," Haraszti continued, "the monopolization by government-friendly voices of the airwaves of the broadcast media is practically almost complete, and that's a very regrettable start to the eve of the next year."

Elsa Vidal of the Paris-based press watchdog Reporters Without Borders says her organization and others will petition the government to reevaluate the decision. Without open access to foreign broadcasts, she says, Azerbaijan will return to the days of Soviet-style media control.

"That would be going back to the Soviet times, when people were obliged to listen to shortwave foreign radio to get a glimpse of what was really going on in their own country, which is just a nightmare," Vidal said.

The broadcasting ban comes as Azerbaijani lawmakers have scheduled a public referendum in March on scrapping presidential term limits.

The current president, Ilham Aliyev, was elected to a second five-year term in October. The referendum, if passed, will allow Aliyev to remain in office for an indefinite term.

By Daisy Sindelar. RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service contributed to this report.
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