Large parts of the Azeri media have staged an orchestrated protest against the planned presence of military officers from neighbouring Armenia at Nato-sponsored exercises later this month.
Leading private and independent daily newspapers on Saturday published blank front pages under the words “The media of Azerbaijan protest against the arrival in Baku of the Armenian military”.
The private TV station ANS stopped broadcasting for three hours, showing a blank screen with the same protest message.
Official and pro-government media outlets have not joined the protest. The Azerbaijani foreign ministry has said it has expressed its concern to Nato over the Armenians’ presence, but refused to lodge an official complaint.
‘Insult’
The protest was announced in a statement published in Friday’s papers and signed by nine newspaper editors.
“We believe that the admission of the Armenian officers to Baku is an insult to the Azerbaijani people,” it said.
There have been repeated outbursts of public anger against Armenia ever since the war between Azerbaijani and Armenian-backed forces over the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in 1994.
The area is still under Armenian occupation and no peace deal has been signed.
Earlier in the week, six members of a group campaigning for Karabakh to be brought back under Azeri control, including its leader, were sentenced to between four and five years in prison following protests on 22 June against the Armenian officers’ visit.
The exercises, organised under Nato’s Partnership for Peace programme, are scheduled for 13 to 26 September.
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