About 60 activists from the Popular Front of Azerbaijan gathered at a central subway entrance in the capital, Baku, and shouted "Freedom!" Police tried to push them into the subway, but the activists managed to disperse and regroup several times, each time shouting slogans.

"We stand against the purposeful, biased pressure on the free media, on the newspaper Azadliq (Freedom), and we see this as an attempt to destroy independent media in the country," Popular Front spokesman Isak Avazogly said.

The 9,000-circulation Azadliq - Azerbaijan's most popular opposition paper - has been threatened with eviction after a government property committee demanded thousands of dollars (euros) in back rent for its editorial offices. The Popular Front, which has offices in the same building, also faces eviction.

Shamil Seyidli, head of the public security department of the Baku police, said four or five activists had been detained because the organizers did not have official permission for the rally.

Also Thursday, a court sanctioned the detention of a reporter and a top editor at a small newspaper that published an article saying Islam was a sham religion that suffocated people, pulled them away from freedom and hindered humanity's development.

Prosecutors last week questioned editor Samir Huseinov and reporter Rafig Tagi and had pledged to charge them with inciting ethnic hatred. The Nasimi district court ruled the two could be held in police custody for up to two months while the investigation continues.

The article published earlier this month in the newspaper Senet prompted an unsanctioned protest in a village north of Baku by angry observant Muslims. The Associated Press

/The International Herald Tribune All/