Communicated on 5 June 2019

FIFTH SECTION

Application no. 55069/11 KHURAL NEWSPAPER and Avaz Tapdig oglu ZEYNALOV against Azerbaijan lodged on 17 August 2011

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

The applicants are a newspaper and its chief editor. The application concerns civil defamation proceedings instituted against the applicants in connection with an article published in the applicant newspaper which stated, inter alia , that a well-known high-ranking State official had interfered in the parliamentary election in one of the electoral constituencies where a prominent Azerbaijani poet stood as a candidate, with the aim of preventing the latter from being elected. The State official sued the newspaper and its editor, claiming that the information was false and damaging to his reputation and seeking a compensation award for damages, to be paid to an orphanage. The domestic courts upheld the claim, ordering the applicants to publish an apology and a refutation and to pay 10,000 Azerbaijani manats in damages, to be transferred to an orphanage.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1. Have the applicants exhausted all effective domestic remedies, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention? In particular, did the applicants invoke before the national authorities, at least in substance, the rights under Article 10 on which they now wish to rely before the Court and, more specifically, did they raise before the national authorities their grievances in respect of the part of their complaint concerning the alleged excessive amount of the award for damages?

2. Has there been an interference with the applicants ’ freedom of expression, within the meaning of Article 10 § 1 of the Convention? If so, was that interference prescribed by law and necessary in terms of Article 10 § 2 in pursuit of a legitimate aim? Was the amount of compensation for damages awarded in the present case in compliance with the requirement of proportionality?

3. The parties are requested to submit a full translation into English or French of the impugned article.