Student protest action dispersed in Baku, several people arrested
On May 3, the “Student Power Center” organization organized a protest action under the slogan “Justice for Students” in front of the building of the Azerbaijan Economic University.
The police dispersed the protesters, several students were detained.
Students of the University of Economics have been expressing their dissatisfaction with the problems in the field of education for a long time.
Student Power Center says they conducted a campaign on social media to solve the problems, published an appeal to the leadership of the university, and even achieved solutions to some pressing issues.
Despite this, “the university leadership began to threaten the protesting students and they were reprimanded.” All this led to an action in front of the university building.
Due to the fact that the police dispersed the rally and detained its organizers, the activists were unable to read the statement in front of the university, but they published the text of the statement on their Facebook page.
The statement addressed to the heads of all Azerbaijani universities led by the leadership of the University of Economics reflected the following requirements:
1.Conduct an opinion poll among students on the subject of the rules for organizing exams, and organize them in the ways and methods with which the students agree;
2. To abolish the system of accounting for the absence of students in the classroom during the period of online classes;
3. To ensure fairness during the examination period, as well as m the transparency of the work of the appeal commissions;
4. To abandon the methods of pressure on the “dissenting” students who criticize the decisions of the university leadership, and punish the officials from the university leadership who threaten the students.
Police officers took away from the protesters a poster with the words “Justice for students!” and detained the chairman of the “Power Center for Students” Ahmed Mammadli, members of the organization Farid Jabbar, Ravan Akhundov, Tyukyazban Kasumova, as well as a young activist, chairman of the student’s demand organization Rustam Ismayilbeyli.
