The president
Azerbaijan has a strong presidential system with a weak separation of powers. The Azerbaijani constitution empowers the president to appoint and dismiss the government. Following the country’s independence in 1993, elected President Heydar Aliyev, a former Soviet communist leader, ruled the country with his New Azerbaijan Party (YAP) with an iron fist, leaving little room for freedom and democracy. YAP has maintained its absolute majority in the parliament since the marred 2005 elections. After his resignation, his son Ilham Aliyev became president in October 2003. Although it was expected that Ilham Aliyev would deviate from his father’s way of governing and create change for the better, governance remained very much the same and no major reshuffling within government took place. In 2009, following his re-election as president in 2008, Aliyev passed a referendum which removed the presidential consecutive term limit, thereby allowing him to run for president as many times as he would wish to. He was re-elected for a third term in 2013, and a fourth term in 2018. In 2016, as a result of the referendum, the presidential mandate was extended from five to seven years. The president was also granted the right to schedule early presidential elections and dissolve the parliament if it had, twice in one year, adopted no-confidence measures against the government or rejected presidential nominees to the Constitutional Court, Supreme Court, or the governing board of the Azerbaijani Central Bank.

Government
The political and economic system in Azerbaijan is largely based on a pyramidal web of patronage. Clans, mainly based on regional origin as well as the ruling elite, keep the system intact to secure their financial and power interests. Two clans, the Nakhichevanis and Yerazi, have dominated politics for decades. Heydar Aliyev had his origins in both clans, which gave him a strong powerbase. The Aliyev family stands on top of the pyramid and makes sure that key-positions in all spheres of society are taken by closely related and like-minded people. This structure has developed into extensive bureaucracy and corruption. Corruption in all spheres of society poses the largest threat to the functioning of the state. Most ministers have bought their jobs and many are directly related to the president. Moreover, membership of the president’s party, YAP, is a precondition for state employment.

Political issues
Human rights organisations and Western governments expressed their concerns about violations in Azerbaijan during the presidential elections in 2013. International observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) criticised the presidential election for failing to meet international standards. It observed counting in 58 per cent of the polling stations to either be bad or very bad. It also claimed that arrests and intimidation of opposition political activists, a restrictive media environment, and violations of the freedom of assembly and association had marred the pre-election campaign.

Political rights and civil liberties

Regarding political rights and civil liberties, Azerbaijan is labeled as ‘not free’ according to the NGO Freedom House. There are limitations to freedom of expression and assembly as well as the rights to liberty and fair trial. The authorities have arrested dozens of political activists on bogus charges, imprisoned critical journalists, broken up several peaceful public demonstrations, and adopted legislation that further restricts fundamental freedoms. Torture and ill-treatment continue under circumstances of impunity. When allegations of beatings, threats, and other forms of abuse are made by arrested political activists in custody, the authorities are known to insufficiently and ineffectively investigate such claims. NGO leaders continue to face threats and harassment from the authorities, including raids by security forces, confiscation of equipment and the imposition of travel bans. Online and social media activities critical of the authorities continue to be prosecuted on fabricated charges, typically drugs-related. Independent journalists continue to face threats, violence and harassment. Azerbaijan was ranked 167 out of 180 countries in the Reporters Without Borders 2021 World Press Freedom Index, which shows the media situation is critical and continues to get worse.

Human rights and gender equality

Not only political rights, but also human rights are limited in Azerbaijan. Multiple human rights violations have been reported, including at two of the biggest events that have taken place in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku. In 2012 Azerbaijan hosted the Eurovision Song Contest. Many journalists covering Eurovision extensively reported on the human rights situation in the country, including interviews with many of those now detained, imprisoned or in hiding. Furthermore, before the 2015 European Games in Baku, organisations and media outlets such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Platform London and The Guardian staff were all prevented from entering Azerbaijan.

Gender equality in Azerbaijan is limited. In May 2021, the NGO Amnesty International released a statement calling to stop gender-based reprisals in Azerbaijan. Female human rights defenders face threats, coercion and violations of their right to privacy in smear campaigns targeted specifically towards women. Furthermore, traditional norms within society restrict women’s roles: care work is mostly done by women while men remain responsible for supporting their family and continue to dominate decision-making power in intimate relationships. This is shown in the political division between men and women: though there are no legal restrictions against the participation of women in politics, the percentage of female members of parliament remains low: 17.6 in 2020.

Gender inequality takes another form for the LGBT+ community. Homophobia is widespread, and Azerbaijan ranks the worst place in Europe to be gay, bisexual and trans. In 2017, the police in Baku detained dozens of people on dubious charges, beating and using electric shocks on some of them to coerce bribes and information on other gay men. Traditional values are often exploited to justify violence against the LGBT+ community. Officially, same-sex conduct was decriminalized in 2000, but the community continues to face discrimination and prosecution.

Nagorno-Karabakh conflict

The Nagorno-Karabakh region is the mountainous territory in the west of Azerbaijan, inhabited by about 150,000 people. It had been part of Armenia until 1923 when Stalin decided to merge it into the Socialist Republic of Azerbaijan, granting the area the status of an autonomous region. Nagorno-Karabakh became de facto independent from Azerbaijan after a war in the early 90s that ended with a truce signed in 1994 but which has nonetheless not led any country to recognise the region as an independent state. Since then, no peace agreement has been found and the situation is referred to be a “frozen conflict”. Tensions remain concerning the area and to which country it belongs: Armenia or Azerbaijan.

Tensions escalated once again in 2020 between the two countries. With both sides prepared for sustained fighting and with Azerbaijan supported by Turkey, a six-week war erupted in the area, costing thousands of lives before it was halted. As a result of the war, Azerbaijan claimed the territory in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, previously controlled by Armenia. More than a third of the population of the area now controlled by Azerbaijan became internally displaced, often fleeing to the Armenian capital. In November 2020, a Russia-led ceasefire was established to end the fighting: Azerbaijan kept the territory it reconquered in the war, and was given control of seven territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh previously held by Armenia. Furthermore, Russian peacekeepers were deployed to the parts of Nagorno-Karabakh that were controlled by Armenian forces.

The situation surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh remains volatile. The opposing military groups are now only separated by 30-100 meters, much closer than before the 2020 war and closer to civilian settlements. Those crossing the border, intentionally or not, are often detained directly, and a number of Armenian prisoners of war have still not been returned to Armenia by Azerbaijani authorities. Since then, Armenia and Azerbaijan have sued the other for crimes in front of the United Nationals International Court of Justice and the European Court for Human Rights respectively, and tensions remain in the border areas.

Since April 2022, Azerbaijan and Armenia are negotiating a new peace deal, mediated by western powers. On April 7, 2022, Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Aliyev met in Brussels alongside European Council President Charles Michel. Lately, progress has been made in the peace talks, with both parties seemingly ready to make concessions. Baku requests a mutual recognition of each other’s territorial integrity – Pashinian said this was acceptable for his government.

Nonetheless, the conflict escalated again on September 13, 2022 after large-scale clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia culminated in the deaths of at least 200 soldiers. The Azerbaijani side indicated it was responding to Armenian provocations. A new ceasefire agreement was announced on September 15, 2022, which has proved fragile to date.

On 19 September 2023, Azerbaijan launched an attack on Nagorno-Karabakh. Within a day, the Armenian authorities were defeated and announced the region would seize to exist starting on 1 January 2024. As the ethnic Armenians being scared of repression, the region was deflated of its population as almost everyone left the region in a mass exodus.