Azerbaijani Youth Leader Arrested, Whereabouts Unknown

Tural Abbasli (file photo)

BAKU -- The chairman of the opposition Musavat Party's youth wing has been arrested and sentenced to 10 days in jail, RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service reports.

Azerbaijani Interior Ministry spokesman Ehsan Zahidov told RFE/RL that Tural Abbasli was sentenced for creating "social disorder."

He did not specify how or when Abbasli committed the crime. He also said he has no information on the whereabouts of Abbasli.

A relative of Abbasli's, Naiba Hasanova, told RFE/RL that people in plainclothes detained Abbasli as he was leaving an apartment block in Baku's Nasimi district on April 29.

She said they pushed her away when she tried to help Abbasli before they drove off.

Police officers in the Nasimi district told RFE/RL that they had no information about Abbasli, and that they had no record of a person with that name being arrested.

Abbasli's mother, Bashxanim Abbasova, says her son's detention might be connected with youth protests marking the first anniversary of a shooting spree at Azerbaijan's State Oil Academy that was violently dispersed by police today.

Dozens of students were detained and several protesters injured.

On April 30, 2009, a Georgian citizen of Azerbaijani origin, Farda Gadirov, opened fire in the Oil Academy building, killing 12 and wounding 13.

Gadirov then killed himself when police attempted to arrest him.