6 opposition media editors start hunger strike

The Azadliq (Freedom) newspaper's editor, Qanimat Zahidov, one of the hunger-strikers, said the protest aimed to highlight repressive policies of President Ilham Aliev's administration.

"We are not only protesting the efforts to expel the Azadliq newspaper but against pressure on freedom of speech and the independent press," he told a news conference.

The five other protesters are the editors of four other opposition newspapers and a news agency. The independent media has suffered frequent harassment in this oil-rich Caspian Sea state, which has been run by Aliev since 2003, when he succeeded his long-ruling father in flawed elections.

A recent official lawsuit has sought to expel the Azadliq newspaper from its offices in a building that is also the headquarters of Azerbaijan's main opposition party, the Popular Front.

An Azadliq reporter was attacked in March in Baku, and an opposition magazine editor was gunned down in the lobby of his apartment building last year.

Last month, Azerbaijani authorities announced they would bar local broadcasters from airing programs of the BBC, Radio Liberty and Voice of America, starting next year.

The Popular Front has accused the government of trying to weaken the opposition and independent media before the 2008 presidential vote. The Associated Press

/The International Herald Tribune/