Azerbaijan, Baku / Trend corr. К.Zarbaliyeva / Eynula Fatullayev, co-founder and editor-in-chief of the newspapers Gundalik Azerbaijan and Realniy Azerbaijan is being charged with tax evasion, Uzeir Jafarov, the editor of Gundalik Azerbaijan, said to Trend Agency.
Aydin Nazarli, Fatullayev'sattorney, said his client refused to give evidence.
Legal proceedings on the special accusatory suit brought by the Chief of the Centre for Protection of Rights of Refugees and IDPs, Tatyana Chaladze against the founder and editor-in-chief of the newspapers Realniy Azerbaijan (Real Azerbaijan) and Gundalik Azarbaycan (Daily Azerbaijan), Eynula Fatullayev, have gone on at Yasamal District Court of Baku today, a source at the Court said.
During his testimony at court, Eynalla Fatullayev noted that he did not consider himself guilty. He said that he had added nothing of his own to the recently-published article named "The Diary of Karabakh" by stressing that all the words that were in the article belong to his interlocutors.
Linguist Rufat Valiyev, who was invited to court as a specialist, said that the article does not contain any words or expressions that could insult the honour and dignity of dwellers of the small Azerbaijani town of Khodjali, which was subjected to genocide by Armenians in February, 1992. According to the specialist, in the article, the author had only written the opinions of the parties.
Some of dwellers of Khodjali, participating at the judicial sitting, were sent out of the court for interrupting legal proceedings.
The plaintiff insisted on the court sentencing Mr Fatullayev to a three-year prison sentence.
However, at a decision by the court, Mr Fatullayev was sentenced to two-years and six-months imprisonment, and detained in the court hall.