After reports of Ukrainian drone strikes in occupied #Crimea, early this morning Russia “temporarily” closed Putin’s doomed Crimea bridge. May just be a standard security check, or (hopefully) due to damage. https://t.co/8Gkd1l4CBw #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/aXwtxQixD6
— Glasnost Gone (@GlasnostGone) December 5, 2023
Day: December 5, 2023
Any discussion about the necessity of continuing military assistance to #Ukraine must invariably be based on the sole (catastrophic) alternative – a “frozen conflict”. And this “frozen” state is not in some abstract realm of “political expediency,” but against the backdrop of a…
— Михайло Подоляк (@Podolyak_M) December 5, 2023
With hundreds of thousands of Russian men killed & wounded & Putin going all out to recruit ever more cannon fodder soldiers, Russia’s invasion of #Ukraine is creating labour shortages in domestic production. Deficit may grow by up to 4 million workers by 2030.… pic.twitter.com/xfzPBW1x3r
— Glasnost Gone (@GlasnostGone) December 5, 2023
An anchor at the independent online Azerbaijani TV channel, Kanal 13, has been sentenced to 30 days of administrative arrest, a week after the channel’s founder was arrested.
Rufat Muradli was convicted on Monday of petty hooliganism and disobeying police. He was arrested on Saturday after an alleged altercation with police officers in Baku.
His lawyer, Nazim Musayev, stated that Muradli was detained following a verbal altercation with plainclothes police officers.
‘Something happened between them in this matter. Rufat resisted, and that’s why they detained him’, said Musayev.
Muradli is the second Kanal 13 journalist to be detained since the recent arrest of the station’s founder, Aziz Orujov, and the arrest of several members of AbzasMedia, another independent Azerbaijani news outlet.
[Read more: Editorial | Ilham Aliyev’s attempt to eradicate the free press cannot succeed]
Muradli is also a member of the Azerbaijan Democracy and Welfare party, whose chair, Gubad Ibadoghlu, has been in prison since August on charges of acquiring or printing counterfeit money.
Several members of Ibadoghlu’s party have been detained in the months following his arrest.
[Listen to the Caucasus Digest: Podcast | The arrest of Gubad Ibadoghlu]
The party’s deputy chair, Adalat Yusubov, dismissed the accusations levelled against Muradli as bogus.
‘The arrest of journalist and party member Rufat Muradli is an example of immorality, immorality, and lack of culture’, wrote Yusubov on Facebook.
‘This arrest is not only ordered but also political in nature. This arrest decision is aimed at limiting Rufat’s political activity and his activity as a journalist.’
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