Azerbaijan, Baku, 7 April / Trend corr K. Zarbaliyeva/ Azerbaijan's Ombudswoman Elmira Suleymanova will apply to the President to pardon the jailed journalists, Ombudswoman said on 7 April.
There are three detained journalists held in Azerbaijan. So far, 219 prisoners, including political prisoners and press representatives, have been released due to appeals by the Ombudswoman. Suleymanova is hopeful that the journalists will be released following the next pardon decree.
According to Suleymanova, one of the demands made by the journalists to implement a structure to protect political prisoners is currently being considered.
On 26 March, Eynulla Fatullayev, editor-in-chief of Gundalik Azerbaijan and Realniy Azerbaijan newspapers went on a hunger strike in demand for objective consideration of his case, release of the arrested journalists and for concrete protection measures to be applied by the Council of Europe and OSCE.
In support of Fatullayev, various journalists, party members and human rights activists have also been on hunger-strike for the past 12 days at the editorial office of the Yeni Musavat newspaper.