PPFA reports about hunger strike of opposition activist Fizuli Guseinov

Fizuli Guseinov, an activist of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), who is serving an administrative arrest of 30 days, holds a hunger strike in the police detention facility, said Nureddin Mamedli, Deputy Chairman of the PFPA. Party activists fear for Guseinov's health and state political reasons for his arrest.

"On February 4, Fizuli's brother informed us, referring to the boss of the detention facility that Guseinov was on a hunger strike. On Friday (February 5), I went to the facility to visit Fizuli. But I was not allowed to do it. The facility staff wouldn't inform me or relatives about the duration of Fizuli's hunger strike and about his demands. We can assume that the hunger strike is his protest against illegal arrest," said Mamedli.

He believes that Guseinov was arrested for political reasons.

"After protest actions were held by population in mid-January in regions against high costs and rising prices, our activists are arrested everywhere. Probably, the authorities fear that rallies with social demands may escalate into political actions; therefore they are trying to make selective arrests of opposition activists in order to bring down the protest wave," Mamedli said.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.