Sevinj Vagifgizi, chief editor of anti-corruption investigative outlet Abzas Media, has been detained since November 2023 on multiple financial crime charges in relation to alleged receipt of Western donor funding.
Vagifgizi is one of at least 16 journalists and media workers – 15 of whom CPJ reported on in November and one whose case we confirmed in mid-December – charged with serious crimes between late 2023 and December 1, 2024, in a major crackdown on the independent press and civil society in Azerbaijan.
In 2021, Vagifgizi was one of several Azerbaijani journalists whose phones were found to be compromised by Pegasus, spyware produced by the Israeli company NSO Group.
On November 20, 2023, police in Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku, arrested Abzas Media director Ulvi Hasanli and project manager Mahammad Kekalov and searched the outlet’s offices, where they claimed to find 40,000 euros (US$43,770). Vagifgizi, who was on a work trip abroad, immediately returned to Azerbaijan despite saying she knew she would likely be arrested, and was detained on arrival at Baku airport at 1:30 a.m. on November 21.
A court later ordered Vagifgizi, Hasanli, and Kekalov into pretrial custody on charges of conspiring to bring a large sum of money into the country illegally. Police subsequently also arrested Abzas Media journalists Nargiz Absalamova, Hafiz Babali, and Elnara Gasimova on the same currency smuggling charges.
On November 28, Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the U.S., German, and French envoys and accused their embassies and organizations registered in those countries of illegally funding Abzas Media. Reports in Azerbaijani state and pro-government media used materials that apparently had been leaked from authorities’ investigation into Abzas Media to accuse the outlet’s staff of illegally bringing undeclared grants from foreign donor organizations into the country.
Vagifgizi and her colleagues denied the charges. A statement issued by Abzas Media said the charges were retaliation by Aliyev for “a series of investigations into the corruption crimes committed by the president of the country and his appointed officials.”
In the months prior to the arrests, Abzas Media published series of investigations into the wealth of public figures such as the son-in-law and other family members of Aliyev, the head of Azerbaijan’s state security service, and the country’s foreign minister.
Abzas Media is one of three major outlets – including Toplum TV and Kanal 13 – from among Azerbaijan’s last remaining independent media targeted over alleged receipt of Western donor money between late 2023 and December 1, 2024. The crackdown has been linked to a decline in Azerbaijani-Western relations, as well as to authorities’ desire to silence criticism amid presidential elections, in which Aliyev secured a fifth consecutive term, and Azerbaijan’s hosting the 2024 United Nations climate change conference, COP29.
Azerbaijani Minister of Internal Affairs Vilayat Eyvazov told CPJ by email on November 30 that any claims that charges against the outlet’s staff were related to their work were “completely groundless.”
In August 2024 authorities brought seven new economic crime charges against the Abzas journalists, including money laundering and tax evasion. The new charges increase the maximum prison sentence the journalists could face to up to 12 years.
Vagifgizi is detained at Baku Pretrial Detention Center, the journalist’s lawyer, Elchin Sadygov, told CPJ, adding that she does not have any health issues. In November 2024, Abzas Media reported that Vagifgizi, Absalamova, and Gasimova had been physically ill-treated by jail guards after protesting about jail conditions, and suffered bruising on their arms and hands.
CPJ emailed the Office of the President of Azerbaijan in November 2024 and the Penitentiary Service for comment in December but did not receive any replies.