About 150 homosexuals and transgenders were detained in Baku during police raids conducted in mid-September. Over a third of them were arrested for up to 30 days, the rest were fined.

Samed Ragimli, a human rights lawyer, coordinates the defence of sexual minorities’ rights, who were exposed to violence and detentions.

"In Azerbaijan, discrimination of sexual minorities took place before, but this time, in mid-September, they conducted large-scale raids; people were detained in city streets. Later, they knocked out information from detainees about their gay friends; and the latter were taken away right from their apartments. Gays and transgenders were subjected to inhuman treatment and torture with electric shockers. Apartments owners were forced to evict their gay tenants," Mr Ragimli asserts.

Khadidja Ismayilova, a journalist and rights defender, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that, apart from the Ragimli’s group, two other advocates are engaged in defending arrested LGBT activists’ rights. They defend 16 people arrested for 20 and 30 days. Thus, according to Ismayilova, the total number of those arrested is 61.

Read more via Caucasian Knot