AZERBAIJAN (ANS) -- The family and friends of imprisoned Baptist pastor Zaur Balaev said they are shocked by the high level of payments reportedly demanded by officials at the prison in the Azerbaijan capital of Baku, where he is now being held.

Azerbaijan is in Southwestern Asia, bordering the Caspian Sea, between Iran and Russia, with a small European portion north of the Caucasus range.

They are upset that bribes are demanded by officials before they will give Balaev food or allow him meetings with relatives, his friends told Forum 18 News Service.

However, Forum 18 reported officials have denied to the news service that such payments are demanded from prisoners.

Balaev lodged a second appeal on Oct. 14 against what he and his fellow Baptists maintain is a “trumped-up charge,” designed to punish him for his leadership of a much-persecuted congregation in a remote village of north-western Azerbaijan. The Supreme Court – which is due to hear Balaev's appeal – has a further month to respond.

Ilya Zenchenko, head of Azerbaijan's Baptist Union, told Forum 18 if the second appeal fails, all that can be done is to wait until Balaev has served two-thirds of his sentence and then apply for early release. “That's if there are no violations or remarks on his record and no provocations,” he told Forum 18.

In a move that Zenchenko described as “disturbing,” police in the southern port town of Neftechala on the Caspian Sea, have threatened local Baptist Jabbar Musaev with the same fate as Balaev.

“On 1 and 2 November, Pastor Telman Aliev and his assistant Jabbar Musaev were summoned one by one by the police for ‘preventative conversations,’” Zenchenko told Forum 18.

Forum 18 reported he added, “Pastor Telman was not intimidated, and is continuing to lead services. But Jabbar was forced not to attend church. They promised to arrange the same thing as happened to Zaur if he appears in church again.”

In what he regards as part of the same campaign, Forum 18 reported Zenchenko also said that police raided and closed down a five-day Baptist children's camp during the summer in Agdash in central Azerbaijan, south east of Yevlakh.

“The authorities are celebrating their temporary victory over some of our brethren,” he told Forum 18. He called for “spiritual and moral support” from around the world.

Forum 18 reported that officials strongly denied prisoners are forced to pay anything to guards before they are given food, water, washing facilities and meetings with relatives.

“No-one pays for anything,” Mehman Sadykov, spokesperson for the Justice Ministry which administers Azerbaijan's prisons, told “The state pays for everything, including food.”

Told that guards constantly demand money from Balaev and his fellow prisoners, Sadykov responded, “Such reports don't correspond with reality.”

Asked how he knows, Forum 18 reported he replied, “I have worked in the system for more than 20 years.”

Sadykov denied that Balaev is a prisoner of conscience being punished for the peaceful exercise of his faith. “We don't have prisoners of conscience,” Forum 18 reported he claimed.

Sadykov's denials were echoed by another senior official with responsibilities in the area of human rights, who spoke off the record. “Of course everything is paid for by the state,” Forum 18 reported the official claimed. “I know many people here complain, but I don't believe that people have to pay.”

However, Zardusht Alizade of the Helsinki Citizens' Assembly rejected those assertions.

“The prison system is absolutely corrupted,” he told Forum 18. “Apart from at the National Security Ministry investigation prison, warders in all other prisons extract bribes from all prisoners for everything.”

Forum 18 reported he also noted that prisoners who cannot raise the money for bribes will not starve, but will get only the bare minimum of poor food that will enable them not to die of hunger.

Elchin Askerov, Deputy Chair of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations, denied suggestions that Baptists and other religious communities face harassment in Azerbaijan, and that Balaev is being persecuted for his faith.

“You have false information,” he told Forum 18. He insisted that according to “official information,” Balaev had been prosecuted for resisting the police. Asked about testimony by Balaev's church members that the case had been fabricated by the police, Askerov responded, “I wasn't there, but I have no reason to believe that the police lied.”

Askerov insisted that the actions had been taken by the police and prosecutor's office, not by his Committee. “It is not within our competence.”

Forum 18 reported he claimed that all religious communities can meet freely for worship. Asked to explain why religious communities – such as Balaev's Baptist congregation – face repeated harassment, he denied that such harassment takes place.

Asked why so many religious communities have failed to get legal status when they apply for it – Balaev's congregation has been trying to get registration since 1994 – Forum 18 reported Askerov responded, “I presume they didn't present their application documents in accordance with the law.”

Told that the local notary has repeatedly refused to notarize the signatures on the registration application, he said, “I don't know why.”

Forum 18 reported Balaev was transferred on Oct. 26 to Ordinary Regime Prison Colony No. 10, located in Darnagyul in Baku's Narimanov District.

Since his transfer, fellow Baptists have been able to supply Balaev with warm clothes, a blanket, new glasses and food.

"But the conditions where the prisoners are held are terrible," Zenchenko told Forum 18. "Although the internal regime is supposed not to be harsh, those sentenced are forced to prepare their own food, while all services - including hot water, the possibility to wash and a place to wash and dry clothes – need to be paid for. Even being able to pass something on or have a meeting with a prisoner 'costs' considerable sums of money. This makes people angry."

Zenchenko reported that in prison on his 45th birthday, Nov. 10, Balaev was able to meet his wife Selminaz, as well as their son.

According to Forum 18, Balaev led a Baptist congregation in Aliabad in the far north-west of Azerbaijan, close to the border with Georgia. Like most of the population of the village, he is from the Georgian-speaking Ingilo minority. The congregation has repeatedly had its applications for legal status refused. It has faced years of harassment from the local authorities, backed up by some of the villagers and the imam of the village's Juma Mosque, Darchin Mamedov.

Forum 18 reported that Balaev was arrested on May 20 after police raided what they claimed was an "illegal" religious service. Police alleged he attacked them and he was prosecuted under a law which punishes violence or the threat of violence. He was sentenced to two years in prison by a court in the regional center of Zakatala on Aug. 8. Balaev's appeal was rejected on Oct. 3.

The Baku office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) told Forum 18 that it approached the government about Balaev's case back in July, and has been monitoring all the trial sessions.

"The Office was concerned that the pastor may have been prosecuted due to his religious beliefs," OSCE officials told Forum 18. "The government contended that the religious belief did not play any consideration in the prosecution of Mr. Balaev who was convicted for resistance to the police at the time of his arrest."

For background information see Forum 18's Azerbaijan religious freedom survey at www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=92 

Jeremy Reynalds is a freelance writer and the founder and director of Joy Junction, New Mexico's largest emergency homeless shelter, http://www.joyjunction.org or http://www.christianity.com/joyjunction. He has a master's degree in communication from the University of New Mexico, and a Ph.D. in intercultural education from Biola University in Los Angeles. His newest book is "Homeless in the City: A Call to Service." Additional details about "Homeless" are available at http://www.HomelessBook.com He lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico. For more information contact: Jeremy Reynalds at jeremyreynalds@comcast.net. Tel: (505) 877-6967 or (505) 400-7145. Note: A higher resolution JPEG picture of Jeremy Reynalds is available on request from Dan Wooding at danjuma1@aol.com.