“Isn’t Azerbaijan a democratic republic? Constitutionally, it is, of course. But the constitution is one thing and the political culture and practice are something else.”

— Christel Fricke, director of the Center for the Study of Mind in Nature at the University of Oslo, Norway, writing at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

It’s a new year in Baku, Azerbaijan, which I last wrote about here, after visiting, on behalf of the international Organization of News Ombudsmen, here.

Even as bustling Baku booms, it seems the more things change, the more things…don’t? As Ms. Fricke observes, the struggle continues.

More Baku scenes:

— C.B. Hanif

Will journalistic and other freedoms boom for this Baku youth the way everything else around him seems to be?

A couple of months after my visit, “Journalism 2.0” author Mark Briggs confirmed from Baku that “There certainly is a lot of interest in journalism for a place that has such struggles with it.”

From my latest offering in Florida Weekly’s Palm Beach Gardens edition, here. Or just keep reading:

And now, to be thankful for something completely different:

Unlike other places in the world we live in a country where, in the words of Stephen Biko of South Africa, “I write what I like.”

We get to cuss out our government officials, even question whether their birth certificates were stamped USA or Kenya, without putting our lives at risk like the anti-apartheid martyr.

In contrast, I met human rights attorney and distinguished former Azerbaijan Parliament member Matlab Mutallimli while in that country in March representing my colleagues of the international Organization of News Ombudsmen.

News ombudsmen field concerns at their news organizations and generally respond publicly.

In Baku, the Caspian sea capital of the oil-rich former Soviet republic that now is the Free Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan, the news the other day: “Azerbaijan must immediately release Eynulla Fatullayev.”

It was for his articles critical of the government that Mr. Fatullayev was arrested in 2007 and eventually sentenced to a cumulative eight years in jail on charges ranging from “Incitement of hatred” to tax evasion. So say his defenders, who include the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders.

For years Mr. Fatullayev suffered beatings, threats and the persecution of his family because of his outspoken journalism.

In April the European Court of Human Rights, whose rulings Azerbaijan is obligated to observe, found that Mr. Fatullayev’s rights of free expression had been violated and that he had been unfairly tried. The ECHR ordered his release with 27,822 Euros ($37,854) in compensation.

In July, however, Mr. Fatullayev was sentenced to an additional 2½ years on charges of possession of narcotics, which he says are routinely planted by Baku prison guards to silence critics.

On Nov. 11 the Azerbaijani Supreme Court agreed to implement the ECHR decision — while not addressing the drug charges. And in what the Committee to Protect Journalists called a ruling “blatantly tailored to defy the European Court’s order,” a Baku Appeals Court has said he will remain imprisoned while he appeals those charges.

Other Azeri journalists have been even less fortunate.

Enter my host, Matlab Mutallimli. While I broke from a whirlwind schedule of meetings and interviews with journalists and news organizations, he motioned me to follow him through a crowd to the front of a memorial service at the grave of Elmar Huseynov.

It was the anniversary of the brutal 2005 shooting murder of Mr. Huseynov.

A father's graveside grief for his son.

The award-winning journalist had suffered threats and incarceration for his criticism of Azerbaijani authorities. He was fined and forced to close his popular Monitor after being convicted in 1998 of “insulting the nation.”

The view of many gathered was that the Azeri government was responsible for the assassination of Mr. Huseynov, who our U.S. ambassador at his first memorial service had described as a national hero.

I confess to having little clue about the challenges of establishing a free, democratic, post-Soviet era government.

As a journalist, I also don’t take allegations as givens, one reason I would have liked the organizers of my visit to have arranged for me to speak to “the other side,” so to speak.

Yet one of our government officials there has told me that as for higher levels, they are not open to such meetings. They’ve heard it many times before. Ahh, progress on media? Not really.

A couple of months after my visit, “Journalism 2.0” author Mark Briggs confirmed from Baku that “There certainly is a lot of interest in journalism for a place that has such struggles with it.” Among the hurdles he cited:

“News outlets must receive a special license from the government, which means there is little investigative reporting. (The government doesn’t tolerate criticism.) Independent news sources, mostly online, apparently operate with a single-minded focus on complaining about the government, so the idea of journalistic objectivity and fairness are a ‘are work in progress,’ to put it mildly.’ Still, many journalists I spoke to are hopeful that the Internet will change the game and bring a diversity of voices and reporting to a nation that sorely needs it.”

And the fact that there is no news on regulating the Internet is one place where there is some hope.

Our own news media are not guiltless, of course.

I’ve mentioned before my ombudsman colleagues chastising us U.S. media types for cheerleading our nation and the world into the Iraq disaster. Just this year, we have endured another round of idiotic media fascination over whether President Barack Obama was born in the USA or is a closet Muslim. We’ve had journalists give carte blanc to “angry” folks who threaten to tote weapons to public rallies, rather than call it out as the thinly veiled thuggery that it is.

And sure, our radio and TV blowhards get to say pretty much what they want. But our government doesn’t make us listen. We all get to tune them out. Because — in popular culture jargon — that’s how we roll.

It’s just more of our freedom that we should not take for granted.

So thanks, Dear Readers — especially those of you who fought and marched and even died — for my freedom to write what I hope you and I like.

On a street in Baku.

Thanksgiving Day addenda:

Voice of America: Azerbaijanis Blog for Freedom

MSNBC: Azerbaijan frees second critical blogger

— C.B. Hanif

Here in South Florida, many listeners are concerned about the future of NPR-affiliated WXEL radio and TV. Included are we jazz fans who would love to have WXEL join Miami’s WLRN, and many other other NPR affiliates, in featuring on a daily basis not only European classical, but also America’s classical music and original art form.

In another aside: The D8 reporting provided a reminder that in “journalism,” source still makes a difference. NPR hosted some sessions of  last year’s international Organization of News Ombudsmen conference in Washington, D.C.  Included was an opportunity to tour NPR’s Massachusetts Avenue recording studios and observe a taping of its flagship “All Things Considered.” During one of our sessions, I told NPR execs that as a nearly four-decade listener I consider NPR a national treasure. But I also was compelled to mention the embarrassing lack of diversity in the building. The fact that we were in a “Chocolate City” such as overwhelmingly African-American D.C. only underscored such questions as the “digital divide” going forward, and whether news organizations such as the WSJ and NPR will better reflect, in their staffing and reporting, the so-called “majority minority” nation we are fast becoming.

Schiller’s comments don’t suggest much has changed. The lack of diversity in our too-often disappointing news media apparently didn’t come up in the D8 interview.

For example, Hamer cited Charlie Beckett, directof of POLIS, London School of Economics, Department of Media and Communications, who accurately observed that “Journalism is no longer a product, but a process.”

Without presuming to tell other news ombudsmen how to do their jobs, I concur with Beckett’s well-established observation that journalists “need to reinvent themselves.”

With specific regard to ombudsmen, however, it is my sense that too many media commentators — particularly those who never have actually served as an ombudsman responsible to a news organization’s readers, viewers or listeners — confuse the concepts of “watchdog for the media” and ombudsman for a media outlet.

Regarding the latter, Beckett captured the essence of how well The Palm Beach Post served its readers during my two-decade tenure, the longest of any news ombudsman in the world. He noted (a point also picked up by ONO Executive Director Jeffrey Dvorkin), that ombudsmen must act as:

Facilitators, not judges

Moderators, not regulators

Forums, not courts

Educators, not enforcers

Those sentiments capture the way The Post’s weekly ombudsman column worked: as a reader’s forum, in which the critical aspects were readers’ concerns and staff response. (See here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here …) I basically served as its editor.

Over the years that column was promoted, often in quarter- and full-page ads, as the place where the newspaper conducted a conversation with its readers regarding issues of accuracy and fairness in its news and features offerings.

For all that, for the ombudsman’s independence, and for my opportunity  to provide general interest offerings as well from time to time (see here, here, here, and here), credit went to the paper’s then management, particularly Publisher Tom Giuffrida and Editor Edward Sears.

Overall, the media transparency and accountability introduced in countless columns by news ombudsmen has contributed mightily to the public’s heightened sophistication regarding how news organizations work(ed).

There’s a direct connection, in fact, to the public’s increased ability to question editors’ decisions, as well as to define for themselves what is news.

That increased consumer awareness, hardly common before the advent of news ombudsmen, is another factor exacerbating the digital challenges for journalists, and ombudsmen, today.

A Caspian Sea and street view in Baku.

For those who have been asking, yes I plan to be back with more on my journey to Baku, Azerbaijan for the Organization of News Ombudsmen. Thanks for the encouragement. For now here’s the always informative Aaron in Azerbaijan with links underscoring the serious journalism concerns I heard there. Meanwhile I’m gearing to fulfill commitments made before I went. They include speaking engagements (increasingly with nice honoraria, for which I’m also thankful), that have picked up since the first of the year.

In January, for example, I was keynote speaker for the wonderful Martin Luther King, Jr. Day celebration organized by the outstanding Caribbean American for Community Involvement group in collaboration with the Village of Royal Palm Beach.

During CAFCI's MLK Day celebration...

...officers and committee members take a bow.

With CAFCI President Genieve White (L) and Cultural Exchange Committee Chairwoman Elet Cyrus.

Last month I was invited to share additional insight during Abbey Delray South’s series on Islam and Muslims, which featured the impeccable scholarship of John L. Esposito, Georgetown University professor of Religion and International Affairs.

Also last month, during the Interfaith Memorial Service hosted by the Palm Beach County Haiti Relief Coalition, I had the honor of sharing some thoughts along with fellow members of the Delray Beach Interfaith Clergy Association.

Haiti Interfaith Memorial Service photos courtesy of the Rev. Waymon T. Dixon.

Rabbi Howard Meridy.

Your correspondent.

With clergy and Haitian officials.

This month, there’s more. Tomorrow, thanks to an invitation to speak at Harbour’s Edge in Delray Beach, I Plan to cite University of Michigan Professor Juan Cole to debunk some inexcusable fallacies from New York Times columnist Tom Friedman.

On Thursday I’m due to share some of my own hajj experiences as the “Understanding Other Cultures” discussion group at the Delray Beach Public library entertains a book that I  recommended — Michael Wolfe’s 1,000 Roads to Mecca.

Next Thursday the First Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the Palm Beaches, home of many dear friends, has me participating on a panel that is scheduled to address the subject of death and dying from various faith perspectives.

In between I’m due to serve on a panel regarding marriage during the Florida Conference of Muslim Americans’ regional conference in Miami.

Next month, our Interfaith Clergy Association of the Jewish Community Relations Council hosts our annual Institute Day, with me serving on another panel to help address the topic, “Promoting Civil Discourse in a Polarized Nation: People of Faith Respond.”

Meanwhile, since returning from Azerbaijan, I’ve been busy: last Thursday helping judge the 27th annual Pathfinder High School Scholarship Awards; and Saturday assisting with the annual Men’s Cookery scholarship fundraiser hosted by one of my dear wife’s social service groups, the Greater Palm Beaches Business and Professional Women’s Club.

Still, my buddy Chuck Keefer just told me over on FaceBook that I should write more. I’ve been working that in too; including over at Interfaith21, while also freelance writing and editing, picking up needed multimedia journalism skills and building a consultancy in this Internet age.

“Remember,” Chuck added, “the only content that is worth a damn is local.”

But there’s also something to be said for writing about what you care about. Which is why I plan to be back with more on Baku.

Outside a trendy Baku shop.

The constant contrast of modern and Soviet-era cars, in this case in Masalli in the country's southeast.

The Azerbaijanis consistently were warm and hospitable, as at this roadside stand between Masalli and Lenkeran.

Baku's ancient city wall.

— 30 —

Arriving in Baku, Azerbaijan on behalf of the international Organization of News Ombudsmen, with days full of media meetings lined up, I had figured on spending my evenings pondering musical higher mathematics in what I’d heard were the city’s thriving jazz clubs.

But my hosts, Taleh Shahsuvarli and Matlab Mutallimli, had mapped that part of my schedule too. Far beyond any of my expectations.

For example I  have arrived at the hotel, around midnight Baku time once again, after another full day on the road traveling from meeting to meeting. But the routine changed when yesterday’s meetings concluded. One result: I awoke to breakfast this morning at a hot-spring resort; in a forest some distance from Azerbaijan’s capital city; and had dinner in a family’s garden in another forest, in the hills and mountains that separate this former Soviet republic from Iran.

It’s all been a blur. Meanwhile, all the journalists and other Azeris I have been blessed to meet have been exceedingly gracious.

I plan to share much more about all this, including details of the media meetings, in subsequent posts.

For now, it’s late (although we’re nine hours ahead of folks back in the States), and I’m too beat to think.

But the Internet service that has proved problematic in past days is up. So here are more of the days’ photos. (Viewers should be able to click to enlarge them.)

With my hosts and staff members of Internews, the Azerbaijan Public Association producers of Media Forum.

Finally. Here in Baku, Azerbaijan, speaking to journalists on behalf of the Organization of News Ombudsmen. It’s still hard to get my brain around that fact, but for those who can read Azeri, here are links to the first media reports.

http://mediaforum.az/in/articles.php?lang=az&page=00&article_id=20100302031714010

http://www.musavat.com/new/Media/71925-AMER%C4%B0KALI_MED%C4%B0A_OMBUDSMANI_%E2%80%9CYEN%C4%B0_M%C3%9CSAVAT%E2%80%9Dda_OLDU

http://www.ilk10.az/news.php?id=52909

Prior to my travel via Vienna was the mad dash to fulfill a multitude of writing, speaking, community and personal obligations.

Since my arrival in this jewel of a city on the Caspian Sea, there’s been a whirlwind of meeting and interviews.

Learning of the work of and challenges for journalists in this oil-rich former Soviet Republic with its tremendously storied history has been extremely rewarding.

Yet the prevailing sentiment seems to be that the quality of Azeri journalism — and in some cases Azeri journalists — is hampered by an inability to freely do journalism. Cases cited have included colleagues allegedly murdered,  imprisoned or who still are.

I am hearing these concerns and sharing the experiences of the Organization of New Ombudsmen in improving journalistic accuracy and fairness, accountability and transparency, independence and credibility at news organizations around the world.

While I can lay claim to having been the longest-serving news ombudsman, my ONO colleagues offer a collective wealth of experience and models.

How Azeris choose to develop their news organizations obviously will be their decisions. The societal challenges are not to be taken lightly.

I’m hopeful that, as elsewhere, Azeris from editors to layman, business people to officialdom, can realize benefits from ONO’s experience in bolstering journalistic independence and accountability, thus promoting free and thriving societies.

In the meantime, I have found the Azeris to be a wonderful people, not the least my hosts. Taleh Shahsuvarli is a journalist and author. Matlab A. Mutallimli is an attorney, former parliament member, rights advocate and writer whose innumerable other credits, based on my brief experience, include being one of the most dignified and perceptive human beings I have met. The help of professional translator Gunel Jannatova also has proved invaluable.

(R-L) Matlab Mutallimli, Taleh Shahsuvarli, Gunel Jannatova.

My schedule demands that I sign off. More to come.

“In print, the Guardian is, even now, the ninth or 10th biggest paper in Britain. On the web it is, by most measurements, the second best-read English-language newspaper in the world. If the New York Times really does start charging for access, the Guardian may become the newspaper with the largest web English-speaking readership in the world.” — Alan Rusbridger, Guardian editor-in-chief

Under Rusbridger’s leadership The Guardian already was becoming a leader in ombudsmanship. The paper’s newly established ombud, Ian Mayes, soon was elected ONO’s president. The newspaper went on to host a subsequent London meeting of ONO.

Just as significant is that The Guardian has been a consistent trailblazer in the online possibilities that U.S. newspapers in particular still are trying to get right. The latest exhibit is Rusbridger’s report that:

“In December the journalism we’re producing (was) read by 37 million people around the world – very roughly a third in the UK, a third in North America and a third in the rest of the world,”

Which gets me to The New York Times’ announcement that readers soon will have to pay to play — er, read — some of that publication’s content online.

Already anticipating BuzzMachine.com blogger Jeff Jervis’ take on this, I was not surprised to find him sharing a link to Rusbridger’s observations, such as:

“It may be right for the Times of London and New York, but not for everyone. It may be right at some point for everybody in the future, but not yet.”

Rusbridger’s detailed insight is worth a thorough read.

For additional ONO perspective, here’s my earlier post regarding our  Harvard meeting, during which both Rusbridger and Jarvis spoke.

—

Last, a nod to my outstanding ombudsman colleagues Jamie Gold, who after 10 years is leaving the Los Angeles Times, and Siobhain Butterworth, who after 13 years is leaving The Guardian.

I’m hoping to see both again at our upcoming meeting in Oxford. Some good news in the meantime: Both report their newspapers are appointing successors; the Times already, The Guardian by the end of February.

In contrast, I recall from our president’s update during our last meeting that, with news ombudsmen already rare, readers of U.S. newspapers lost 12 in the previous year.

To my knowledge there no longer are any news ombudsmen in Florida.