Azerbaijan’s human rights record examined by UPR

Azerbaijan’s human rights record examined by the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group for the fourth time on Tuesday, 14 November 2023, in a meeting in Geneva that was webcast live.

Azerbaijan is one of 14 States to be reviewed by the UPR Working Group during its 44th session from 6 to 17 November 2023.

This year, 4 independent LGBTI+ organisations from Azerbaijan prepared submissions.

The Queerdian, the Gender Resource Center, and the Q Collective jointly submitted a report to assist the UN Human Rights Council in its review of Azerbaijan's compliance with international standards on promoting and protecting LGBTIQ+ rights, assessing the effectiveness of existing legal frameworks and their application, and identifying areas of improvements.

Nafas LGBTI Azerbaijan Alliance together with ECOM presented a report highlighting several areas of concern regarding Azerbaijan’s compliance with its international human rights obligations, in relation to violence and discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer (LGBTIQ) community, including bias- motivated speeches and crimes, as well as threats and attacks against LGBTIQ human rights defenders and activists, with respect to rights to non-discrimination, freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly and privacy.

Azerbaijan’s first, second and third UPR reviews took place in February 2009, April 2013, and May 2018, respectively.

The UPR Working Group is scheduled to adopt the recommendations made to Azerbaijan between 16:00 and 18:00 on Friday, 17 November 2023. The State under review may wish to express its positions on recommendations posed to it during its review.