Elchin Mammad
Elchin Mammad is President of the Social Union of Legal Education of Sumgait Youth, which was founded in 2000 in Sumgait, Azerbaijan. The NGO provides free legal assistance to low income families, and legal support for the creation of local NGOs. It also organises experience exchanges for human rights defenders. Elchin Mammad is a human rights lawyer and editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Yukselish Namine”, which reports on activities of human rights defenders and NGOs in Azerbaijan.
The space for human rights defenders (HRDs) and NGOs has been steadily shrinking in Azerbaijan. A number of legislative amendments have been adopted in recent years that restrict the work of HRDs and put their activities under strict governmental control. The roundup of the most prominent HRDs and their subsequent trials and imprisonment indicate that Azerbaijan is well on the road towards authoritarianism, seemingly adopting a Russian-style contempt of civil society.
