Azerbaijan, Baku, 19 May / corr. Trend E. Babayev/ The Opposition of Azerbaijan believes that there has not been a progress from the democratic viewpoint in Azerbaijan since it was admitted into the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe and OSCE are playing political games," this statement was made in the round table organized by the support of Eldar Namazov, the President of the For Azerbaijan public forum.
Talat Aliyev, the deputy chairman of the Democratic Party of Azerbaijan said that the number of imprisoned journalists has increased and freedom of assembly has been restricted more after Azerbaijan was admitted to the Council of Europe. In a word, Azerbaijan has been left behind from democratic point of view. He added that these organizations are working on the principle of 'one step forward and two steps backward'. According to Aliyev, although the additions and changes to the Election Code are undemocratic enough, neither Council of Europe nor OSCE express their opinion in this regard.
The human rights activist Novella Jafaroglu said during the round table that Azerbaijani nation has lost its confidence in the opposition. At present, the opposition should try to unite, but not to be become a president. "The Azerbaijani people is active enough, simply there is no a person within the opposition who could unite it and could announce the public that they are uniting for the presidential elections," she said.
Namazov also said that the opposition of Azerbaijan has split, therefore, holding this events aims at expressing general idea of the opposition.
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