Institute for War & Peace Reporting: "College closure sparks hunger strike in Azerbaijan"

"We demand the restoration of our right to an education", "Stop this lawlessness", read the placards on the walls of a small auditorium in the Independent Azerbaijan University in Baku, where scores of students have been on a hunger strike since June 1 over the closure of the institution.

With drinking water in short supply and no air-conditioning as summer temperatures soar, there are concerns about the health of the protesters who just a few weeks ago had been poring over tomes of constitutional law in the same room.

"The action is being conducted in extremely bad conditions," representative of the American Lawyers Association Robert Eisman, who visited the university, told IWPR.

The Independent Azerbaijan University along with the Baku branch of the Moscow-based Law and Management University closed when the authorities declined to renew their teaching licenses on May 5.

The two universities were the first victims of education ministry's move to raise standards among local branches of foreign institutes and private Azerbaijani colleges.

Even more controversial was a ban on the latter admitting new students to their medical and law faculties, whose courses are some of the most prestigious in the country, commanding high academic fees, on which the colleges depend for their survival.

The education ministry maintains that the institutes they've targeted care more about financial profits than education, alleging that they've increased student numbers each year, in some cases illegally, with little regard to teaching capacity.

In 2005, a special commission - comprising representatives from a number of government departments - examined the quality of teaching at non-state colleges, concluding that many of them were not up to scratch.

It ruled that 17 higher education institutes in the country failed to reach the required standards, but they continued to admit new students, nonetheless.

Their supporters insist that, notwithstanding their shortcomings, they make the higher education field more competitive.

"The emergence of private institutions several years ago put an end to the monopoly of Baku's State University and Medical University," said leading academic Azhdar Agayev. "The market will sort out the problems, as those with competent staff will prosper."

But the authorities have little sympathy with such attitudes and appear determined to clamp down on non-state colleges that they deem to have acted illegally.

The education ministry says its decision to revoke the license of the Independent Azerbaijan University stemmed from its admission of 1,700 students who had not passed their entrance examinations.

The protesters say that they shouldn't be punished for university mismanagement, demanding that they be allowed to study at another college. "We demand restoration of our right to receive higher education," said the chairman of the students' rights protection committee Elnur Mamedov.

The hunger strike has taken its toll on the students: their number has dropped from 100 to 60, with 12 taken to hospital.

One of the latest to receive medical treatment was Etimad Budagov who was suspected of contracting tuberculosis. He was admitted to hospital on June 9 and the auditorium where the protest is taking place was disinfected.

Health officials warned the other protesters that they risked infection and advised them to put a halt to the hunger strike and allow doctors to inspect them.

Late last week, the education ministry appeared to make substantial concessions to the students, offering to grant diplomas to final year students and transfer those in their third year of study to other private colleges.

"Students have no reasons to continue the action, since all their demands have been fulfilled," said head of the university's information department Zahira Samedova.

But the protesters are now saying that they will only end their strike once the ministry’s promises have been fulfilled.

And some say the concessions don't go far enough, arguing that final year students should also have the option to be transferred to private colleges, as the diplomas the ministry says it will grant them will be worthless if the university's license is revoked.

"What's the point of getting diplomas from a university that has no license?" said the chairman of the students' rights protection committee Elnur Mamedov.

Rights campaigners are backing the student protest.

"It's not the students' fault that the authorities have for some odd reason tolerated such universities [for so long]," said head of the Human Rights Centre of Azerbaijan Eldar Zeinalov, who believes that the action taken by the authorities is a violation of constitutional law.

Unless their demands are met, the protesters say they intend to sue the leadership of their university and the education minister Misir Mardanov. Threats of legal proceedings have also been voiced by other colleges targeted by the authorities.

By Leila Amirova

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