CPJ calls on Swiss authorities to protect Azerbaijani journalist Emin Huseynov

New York, February 27, 2026—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Swiss authorities to ensure exiled journalist and human rights defender Emin Huseynov’s safety after Huseynov said he was followed on multiple occasions, including by at least one man he said was carrying a gun.

“Claims that Emin Huseynov is being surveilled and followed by armed men are deeply concerning,” said Fiona O’Brien, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia regional director. “Given Azerbaijan’s record of targeting exiled journalists, the Swiss authorities must conduct a full and swift investigation, and take all necessary measures to ensure his safety.”

Huseynov, co-founder of the Switzerland-based Azerbaijani press freedom group Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety, told CPJ that he was attending a human rights conference in Geneva on February 18 when he noticed two men who appeared to be surveilling him; one with a gun under his jacket.

Huseynov said that while he was walking home later that evening, he saw one of the men watching him again. When he tried to confront him and began recording with his phone — footage since published on YouTube — the man ran.

Huseynov said he has since reported three further episodes of apparent surveillance to Swiss police, who told him they are investigating.

The incidents come as Huseynov’s brother, journalist and blogger Mehman Huseynov, has been publishing a high-profile series of video reports critical of Azerbaijan’s president Ilham Aliyev and his family, in which Emin features. Mehman Huseynov, who was jailed between 2017 and 2019 because of his work, has reported receiving death threats as a result of his videos and lives under police protection in Europe. Azerbaijani pro-government media have launched a smear campaign against the brothers.

Emin Huseynov told CPJ he considers the incidents of surveillance to be “attempted kidnappings or assassinations,” pointing to previous assassination attempts against exiled blogger Mahammad Mirzali that French authorities linked to the Azerbaijani state, and the 2017 abduction of Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli from Georgia.

Emin Huseynov also linked the events to questions he posed to Aliyev and his wife, Azerbaijani Vice President Mehriban Aliyeva, while reporting on a regional security conference in Germany earlier this month.

Huseynov has resided in Switzerland since 2015, when he fled Azerbaijan in a Swiss diplomatic plane after months of hiding at the Swiss Embassy while authorities sought his arrest on trumped-up charges.

Amid an escalating press freedom crackdown, Azerbaijan ranked as the world’s sixth-worst jailer of journalists in CPJ’s latest prison census, with at least 24 journalists behind bars. Multiple Azerbaijani journalists and bloggers residing in Europe and the U.S. have been sentenced to lengthy prison terms in absentia in recent months.

CPJ’s email to the office of the president of Azerbaijan requesting comment did not receive a reply.