Just two days after Amnesty International launched its Twitter campaign to call for the release of the journalist and editor Eynulla Fatullayev, his name was included in a list of prisoners to be pardoned ahead of the 93rd anniversary of the founding of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic. Human rights activists in Baku believe that the release of Fatullayev is connected with Azerbaijan’s victory in the Eurovision song contest two weeks ago and numerous subsequent calls to improve the country’s human rights record ahead of hosting the event next year.

This year the UK branch of Amnesty International celebrated its 20th annual Media Awards Ceremony, recognizing excellence in human rights journalism. During the event, over 70 leading UK journalists took part in a twitpic action launched on behalf of Fatullayev, who was the winner of the 2009 Special Award for Journalism Under Threat.

The action targeted Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev’s twitter account, calling to release the journalist who had been imprisoned since 2007 on a series of charges, including defamation, terrorism, tax evasion and incitement to ethnic hatred. Since then, diplomats, local and international civil and human rights activists and journalists have constantly campaigned for his release. When President Aliyev signed the pardon decree on May 26, over 700 Amnesty supporters throughout the world had joined the campaign for Fatullayev’s release.

Supporters portrayed Fatullayev as a prisoner of conscience, jailed for the publication of articles critical of the government. As the editor of the now defunct newspapers Realny Azerbaijan and Gündalik Azarbaycan, Fatullayev was imprisoned shortly after publishing a piece highly critical of the official probe into the murder of his former boss and editor, Elmar Huseynov. Following a series of charges, Fatullayev was jailed and sentenced to eight and a half years in prison.

Even though the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ordered his immediate release in March 2010, Azerbaijani authorities continued to hold Fatullayev in prison on a new conviction for drugs possession. In a statement regarding the launch of the social media campaign, Amnesty international stated that “We firmly believe that all the charges against Eynulla have been fabricated to silence his critical reporting of the Azerbaijani government, and that Eynulla is a prisoner of conscience”.

After his release, Fatullyayev said that his pardoning was unexpected. Expressing happiness to be free, he affirmed his intention to continue his journalism career. In an interview to the newspaper Zerkalo, Fatullayev said “I was arrested in one country, but freed in another country. The situation has changed, that time there was a different regime. Glamorous authoritarism has been replaced by cruel despotism”.

Fatullayev’s release did not put an end to the problem of political prisoners in Azerbaijan. In recent weeks courts have convicted two social media activists, Jabbar Savalanli and Bakhtiar Hajiyev, for drug possession and draft evasion in cases described by human rights organizations as “clearly politically motivated prosecutions”. Both youth activists had used Facebook and other social media to criticise the authorities and call for public protests. Observers believe that these arrests were attempts by the authorities to prevent Middle East-type protests from spreading to Azerbaijan.

“These are two fresh examples of the government's efforts to silence critical voices”, said Rachel Denber, acting Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “It is shocking that a Council of Europe member is getting away with such blatant repression”.

Savalanli, a 20-year-old activist of the opposition Popular Front Party, is an active social media user and had posted several highly critical comments of the Azerbaijani leadership and called on it to resign. Human rights activists and international observers expressed concern that the charges were unfounded and had been brought in retribution for his political opposition to the government. An Azerbaijani court sentenced Savalanli to two and a half years in prison on May 4. A forensic narcotics examination conducted by state officials on Savalanli stated that no signs of drug dependency could be identified but could not exclude the possibility that he had used drugs. Savalanli's lawyer's request of a further independent examination was denied.

Bakhtiar Hajiyev, a Harvard University graduate and a member of the youth movement “Positive Change”, was arrested in advance of a protest planned for March 11 that he actively promoted through social media. He was sentenced to two years for evading military service. His lawyer noted that the police severely beat Hajiyev while in custody and that the prosecutor's office failed to investigate his complaint about the abuse.

On May 12, the European Parliament passed a resolution expressing “deep concern at the increasing number of incidents of harassment, attacks, and violence against civil society and social network activists and journalists in Azerbaijan”. It strongly deplored the “practice of intimidating, arresting, prosecuting and convicting independent journalists and political activists on various criminal charges”, and called on the authorities to release all members of the opposition, youth activists, and bloggers in custody.

Local human rights activists have urged President Ilham Aliyev to release all political prisoners ahead of next year’s Eurovision Song Contest in Baku.

U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan Matthew Bryza called the release of  Fatullayev “a demonstration of extremely positive changes ... What can be a better start for the preparation process for Eurovision-2012 in Baku?”, Bryza told journalists on May 27.

On May 26, over 30 representatives of Azerbaijan’s civil society issued an open letter addressed to President Aliyev. Drawing attention to the fact that hosting the 2012 Eurovision contest in Baku will imply close scrutiny of the human rights situation in the country, they urged Aliyev to take major steps to reduce social tensions in society. “This is the alarming background situation against which Eurovision 2012 will be held in Baku. We draw your attention to the tense human rights situation in the country, including violations of freedom of speech, assembly and association, and especially the issue of political prisoners”, the appeal read.