Azerbaijan: CPJ condemns shocking sentences handed down in Toplum TV case

New York, July 28, 2026 – The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the extremely harsh prison sentences of up to 15 years handed down on July 27 to journalists and other individuals associated with leading Azerbaijani news outlet Toplum TV on charges related to receipt and use of foreign funds.

“The shockingly heavy sentences meted out to nine individuals linked to Toplum TV are a textbook example of how an absence of international accountability emboldens autocrats like Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev,” said Fiona O’Brien, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia regional director. “More than two dozen journalists and media workers are now unjustly jailed in Azerbaijan, victims of a relentless crackdown on independent journalism. European states in particular must wake up to the fact that their increasingly warm ties with Aliyev’s regime – and their failure to hold it to international human rights standards – not only have devastating consequences inside Azerbaijan but also undermine their claims to stand for media freedom.”

The Serious Crimes Court in the capital, Baku, found the nine individuals — who include journalists, a journalist trainer, project managers, and the founders of media outlets — guilty of acting as an “organized criminal group” to commit multiple financial crimes connected to the receipt and use of Western donor funds, in violation of Azerbaijani legislation, by four connected organizations: Toplum TV; the nonprofit Institute for Democratic Initiatives (IDI); Fakt Yoxla, a fact-checking platform run by IDI; and Third Republic Platform, a political group.

The court delivered the following sentences, and ordered Toplum TV journalist Elmir Abbasov, who was the only defendant to remain free pending trial, to be taken into custody in the courtroom:

• Akif Gurbanov, Toplum TV co-founder, IDI chairperson, and Third Republic Platform spokesperson – 15 years
• Alasgar Mammadli, Toplum TV co-founder and media lawyer – 14 years
• Mushfig Jabbar, Toplum TV video editor – 13 years 
• Farid Ismayilov, Toplum TV reporter – 12 years
• Elmir Abbasov, Toplum TV social media manager – 12 years
• Ruslan Izzetli, Third Republic Platform co-founder – 15 years
• Ali Zeynal, IDI journalist trainer – 14 years
• Ilkin Amrahov, IDI project coordinator – 14 years
• Ramil Babayev, IDI project coordinator – 13 years

The accused are among dozens of journalists and right defenders arrested in a major crackdown on the press and civil society following Azerbaijan’s military recapture of the Nagorno-Karabakh region in 2023. Most of the journalists have been charged over alleged receipt of Western funding, amid a decline in relations with the West following that military campaign.

Police raided the offices of Toplum TV and IDI and arrested most of those listed above in March 2024. In a separate case, Toplum TV presenter Shahnaz Baylargizi is under a travel ban pending investigation on similar charges.

In June last year, authorities sentenced six journalists and media workers from Abzas Media, Azerbaijan’s leading anti-corruption investigative outlet, and one from U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Azerbaijani service to prison terms of between seven and a half and nine years on similar funding allegations. Twelve journalists and media workers remain on trial in a case against Germany-based Meydan TV.

Azerbaijani law requires civil society groups to obtain state approval for foreign grants and authorities say the targeted outlets failed to comply.

In rulings on similar cases, the European Court of Human Rights stressed that such an omission was punishable under Azerbaijani law by fines, not criminal sanctions. Independent experts say that authorities refuse to register independent organizations seeking foreign grants, making it impossible to legally receive the funding.

Azerbaijan was the world’s sixth-worst jailer of journalists in 2025, according to CPJ’s prison census. At present, at least 25 journalists are being held in reprisal for their work. Authorities have also heavily restricted international media and sentenced exiled journalists to lengthy prison terms in absentia.

CPJ emailed the Office of the Prosecutor-General of Azerbaijan for comment but did not immediately receive a reply.