Aliyev’s party wins Azerbaijan’s parliamentary election, opposition cries foul

Aliyev had called Sunday’s snap legislative election ahead of schedule to avoid the poll coinciding with the COP29 climate conference that Baku is to host on November 11-22.

None of the elections held in Azerbaijan under Aliyev’s two-decade rule have been recognised as free and fair by international observers.

The electoral commission said Aliyev’s Yeni Azerbaijan party won 68 seats in the 125-member legislature.

Another 45 seats were won by independent candidates as well as 12 seats by candidates from nine political parties — all of them widely believed to be pro-government.

Only one opposition candidate from the Republican Alternative Party made it to parliament.

The opposition Musavat party stated there were “mass violations,” including multiple voting.

International observers from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe are set to hold a press conference later Monday to present their findings following the vote.

Baku has faced strong Western criticism for persecuting political opponents and suffocating independent media.

Aliyev, 62, has ruled the ex-Soviet republic with an iron fist since 2003, after the death of his father, Azerbaijan’s Soviet-era Communist leader and former KGB general Heydar Aliyev.

He enjoys widespread popularity due to Azerbaijan’s military victory over Armenian separatist forces that had controlled the Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh region for three decades.

Last year, Baku’s troops recaptured the mountainous enclave in a lightning offensive, after which its entire ethnic Armenian population — more than 100,000 people — fled to Armenia.

With power concentrated in the presidency, Azerbaijan’s parliament has a limited role in shaping affairs in the Caspian Sea nation.