As the oil-rich nation of Azerbaijan prepares to host Eurovision for the first time, critics are pointing to numerous human rights violations that have flourished under the autocratic regime of President Ilham Aliyev -- and say that Eurovision officials and other European authorities are willingly turning a blind eye.

In the run-up to next week's Eurovision Song Contest, seven hotels in the host city, Baku, have been quizzed by a rights group about claims that hidden cameras have been placed in guest rooms to record people having sex so as to blackmail them.

As Baku prepares to host the 57th Eurovision Song Contest -- a bejeweled meringue of a spectacle, with unabashedly gay overtones -- the country's unyielding stance on sexual minorities is coming under fresh scrutiny.

As Azerbaijan prepares to host the Eurovision Song Contest later this month, a shimmering glass-and-steel showcase is being built. The Azerbaijani government has spent $134 million to build the 23,000-seat Crystal Hall, but an investigation by RFE/RL and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project reveals the president's family is personally profiting from the massive construction project.

The contract for the Chovdar gold field in western Azerbaijan, worth an estimated $2.5 billion, was awarded in an opaque process in 2007 to a U.K. consortium, AIMROC, that was hastily created for the project. Newly discovered documents now reveal that AIMROC is actually a shell company controlled by companies tied to President Ilham Aliyev's daughters.

A scuffle broke out in the Georgian parliament on April 24 after a deputy suggested that the country consider recognizing the World War I-era Armenian massacres as genocide. Unfortunately, the session was attended by a group of schoolchildren who had come for a lesson on civic education.

The government of Russia's North Caucasus Republic of Chechnya has invited the state oil company of Azerbaijan to explore for oil in the violence-riddled region.