Azerbaijan arrests director of sole independent news agency

BAKU: Azerbaijan on Thursday arrested the director of the country's only independent news agency, Turan, which is seen as a rare voice of dissent in the tightly-controlled Caspian Sea nation.
Mehman Aliyev, "was detained on tax evasion and abuse of office charges," his lawyer Fuad Agayev told AFP.
Last Friday, Aliyev, who also owns the agency, said prosecutors had frozen Turan's bank accounts, a step that could close the business.
He said the move was part of a criminal probe into an alleged US$22,000 (RM94,149) in unpaid taxes, a charge he said was false, adding that "Turan risks closure at any moment."
Human Rights Watch has denounced the case as the "latest in a vicious crackdown on critical media" in energy-rich Azerbaijan.
"Using bogus tax-related charges to jail critical journalists is nothing new for Azerbaijan," said Giorgi Gogia, the rights watchdog's director for South Caucasus.
The authorities in oil-rich Azerbaijan have faced strong international criticism over claims they routinely harass and jail strongman President Ilham Aliyev's opponents on trumped up charges. Officials deny this.
Ex-Soviet Azerbaijan ranked 162 out of 180 countries in the 2017 World Press Freedom Index released by Reporters Without Borders.
Aliyev took over in 2003 after the death of his father Heydar Aliyev, a former KGB officer and communist-era leader who had ruled Azerbaijan with an iron fist since 1993. — AFP