Watchdog

BAKU -- Khadija Ismayilova, a jailed Azerbaijani investigative journalist and RFE/RL contributor, has been allowed to see relatives for the first time since her arrest in early December.

Ismayilova’s sister Sabina Rahimova said March 25 that she had seen Khadija on March 24 in a Baku detention center and talked to her through a glass window.

Rahimova's daughter was also present.

Rahimova said that her sister's spirits were high and that Ismayilova asked her to pass on greetings to friends, colleagues, and other relatives.

Ismayilova, 38, was arrested on December 5 and ordered held in pretrial detention on suspicion of inciting an attempted suicide.

She denies wrongdoing and says her arrest was politically motivated retribution from the authorities for her investigative journalism.

Ismayilova’s detention has been widely condemned by international rights groups as part of a persistent campaign by President Ilham Aliyev's government to intimidate and silence independent activists and journalists.

A Russian court has fined the Sakharov Center human rights organization for failing to register under a "foreign agent" law.

The fine by the Moscow court was for 300,000 rubles ($5,100) for the center named after Nobel Prize-winning Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov.

The organization said in a statement posted on its website on March 23 that it would appeal the decision.

The controversial law, signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2012, forces NGOs that receive foreign funding and carry out political activities to register as an "organization performing the functions of a foreign agent."

The Sakharov Center's director, Sergei Lukashevsky, said the court case was "absurd."

He added that the group had received foreign funding but denied that it did any political work.

Lukashevsky said its activities were "educational" and informed people while also promoting "public discussion."

Moscow's Sakharov Center was where thousands of people came to pay their final respects to slain Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov before he was buried earlier this month.

With reporting by AFP