He said his client was tortured by police. Azerbaijan disbarred him

(CN) — When Azerbaijani lawyer Yalchin Imanov spoke up about his client being tortured in prison, he lost his license — a decision Europe’s rights court ruled on Tuesday was disproportionate and incompatible with the principles of a democratic society.

In a unanimous ruling, the European Court of Human Rights found that stripping Imanov of his ability to practice law violated his basic rights to privacy and free expression. The judges said Azerbaijan had offered no convincing reason why such a harsh measure was needed.

In 2017, Imanov publicly accused prison officials of torturing his client, A.H., a member of the Muslim Union movement convicted after a deadly 2015 police raid in Nardaran, a suburb of the capital, Baku. The raid, aimed at breaking up what authorities called a plot to stir unrest, left six people dead and led to dozens of arrests.

After his comments appeared in the press, the prison service accused Imanov of defamation and blamed him for unrest outside its headquarters.

The bar association soon opened disciplinary proceedings, echoing the government’s claim that his remarks “could be damaging to the reputation of penal institutions and breach the presumption of innocence of prison guards, and maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.”

Within months, Imanov was suspended and then permanently disbarred in 2019.

The rights court said Imanov had simply been doing his job, representing a client who said he had been tortured, and that his comments served the public interest.

When Imanov challenged his disbarment in Azerbaijani courts, he lost every appeal. The Strasbourg judges said the national proceedings themselves fell short of fairness, noting that “the domestic courts failed to sufficiently assess the proportionality of the interference” and “did not explain why the applicant’s misconduct was so serious that it justified the harshest disciplinary sanction.”

The court said Imanov’s case fits into a wider pattern documented by the U.N. and the Council of Europe, which have long warned that lawyers in Azerbaijan who defend opposition figures or touch politically sensitive cases often face retaliation.

His disbarment, the judges found, was another example of that pressure — part of a broader crackdown on critics, activists and human-rights defenders. They added that such punishment doesn’t just silence one lawyer but sends a message to others, discouraging them from speaking out or defending their clients.

The Strasbourg judges said lawyers play a crucial part in how justice works, linking ordinary people to the courts. That job, they added, comes with responsibility but also the right to speak freely.

Concluding that Imanov’s disbarment couldn’t be justified under Europe’s human-rights treaty, the judges ordered the government to pay him 10,000 euros (about $11,600) in damages and 2,000 euros in legal fees. The ruling doesn’t restore his license but could clear the way for his return to the bar if Azerbaijan follows through.

Two of the judges, Ioannis Ktistakis and Darian Pavli, partly disagreed with the majority. They agreed that Azerbaijan had violated Imanov’s rights but said the court didn’t go far enough.

In their view, the disbarment wasn’t just unfair — it served no legitimate purpose and was politically driven, part of a wider effort to silence human-rights lawyers. They said the measure was grossly disproportionate and should have been recognized as an abuse of power under Article 18 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which bars governments from using legal measures for political ends.

Imanov himself echoed that view. In a statement to Courthouse News, he said he was disappointed that the court stopped short of finding a violation of Article 18, calling it “the main context of the case.”

“In an authoritarian country like Azerbaijan, the deprivation of lawyers’ licenses is driven by a single political will,” he said. He added that the ruling should draw global attention to “the serious problems of human-rights lawyers in Azerbaijan,” many of whom, he noted, work under constant threat of losing their licenses or being arrested.

Professor Philip Leach, one of Imanov’s representatives before the Court, said the judgment should spur broader reform.“To disbar a human rights lawyer for reporting publicly about their client’s ill-treatment in prison is a shocking and dangerous precedent,” he said. “Lawyers’ freedom of speech must be protected, and this judgment should act as a catalyst for real change in Azerbaijan.”

Azerbaijani authorities did not respond to a request for comment.

The judgment will become final in three months unless either side asks for the case to be referred to the court’s Grand Chamber.

Courthouse News reporter Eunseo Hong is based in the Netherlands.