All posts filed under: Azerbaijan

International Women’s Day: Free Khadija Ismayilova!

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Happy International Women’s Day! Time to remember an important one, Khadija Ismayilova, in jail, for being damn good at her job as an investigative reporter and raising mighty quantities of hell while investigating Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and family’s shady business dealings. Turns out they are looting their country! I had the privilege to work with Khadija, be challenged by Khadija, and occasionally even bullied and reminded of moral courage and moral cowardice by Khadija. She is pure quality and intellect and she is serving a 7.5 year sentence for incitement to suicide by a boyfriend who has since recanted and was at the center of an effort at sexual blackmail against Khadija that occurred four years ago to this day with the arrival of a mysterious envelope postmarked Moscow and delivering contents reflecting pure KGB tactics. She went public, just a few months before Eurovision, so they retaliated by releasing a video on a mirror site made to look like one of the opposition parties, Musavat, who would of course have no interest in …

Etem Erol, 1955-2016

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The last message I had from Etem hoca was just a few days before he passed away. I had a night layover in Istanbul on my way to Odessa for two months and I asked if he wanted to join some friends for dinner, so naturally I invited Etem, as I had not been back to the city I called home for two years in over a year. He wrote to say he regretted he could not make it that he was leaving early that same morning for Bulgaria with his brother. It was in Bulgaria, I came to learn just a few nights ago from a classmate and fellow student in his Elementary Turkish I class so many years ago, that he had a heart attack and died in his brother’s arms. He was so young, 60, and with so much life and so much still to give. I write this with tears streaming down my face and it’s been more than a day now since I heard this really excruciatingly painful news. It …

*** END OF THE YEAR FLASH PRINT SALE: 12 8″x10″ PRINTS AVAILABLE FOR $100 EACH ***

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12 days of Christmas, 12 months in the year, 12 days to go until the new year, 12 prints to put under the tree and then on a wall… Through the New Year, I am offering a dozen of my favorite images culled from the last three years of my “best of” annual blog posts showcasing my favorite images from the year. All prints are signed. Sale is on from now until January 1, 2016. My way of saying thank you for supporting my work and hope you will continue to! You can choose from the following prints: “Baku Billionaire Ibrahim Ibrahimov at Breakfast” Location: Baku, Azerbaijan “Creation Museum” Location: Petersburg, Kentucky, USA “Never Forget September 11 and Budweiser” Location: Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA “Foreign Domestic Workers, Cyprus” Location: Nicosia, Cyprus “Gezi Park Protests Popcorn Vendor” Location: Istanbul, Turkey “Offshore Oil Platform Sails Into the Caspian” Location: Baku, Azerbaijan “An Avar Woman in the Cornfield” Location: Danaci, Azerbaijan “An Avar Family on a Motorcycle and Sidecar” Location: Danaci, Azerbaijan “Avar Schoolchildren on the First Day …

Seven Years, Six Months for Khadija Ismayilova or The Shame of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev

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This is Khadija Ismayiova, a PEN Freedom to Write, International Women’s Media Fund Courage in Journalism award-winning Azerbaijani investigative journalist. Today she was sentenced to seven years and six months in jail in Azerbaijan for the crime of committing really, really good journalism by investigating and reporting accurately and truthfully on the shady business dealings of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and his family. Unless of course you believe she is guilty of her actual charge, inciting an ex-boyfriend who was compromised by Azerbaijani “Security Services” to suicide – a charge he has since recanted. Oh and p.s. he remains alive to have made the accusation. The Aliyevs’ interests touch every aspect of the economy, from oil to gold mines to telecoms to aviation to luxury hotels to presumably so much more. We know this because of Khadija’s efforts. Today, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project revealed the Aliyevs interest in yachts allegedly owned by the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic or SOCAR. Wife Mehriban’s biggest problem seems to be that the yachts …

The Phoblographer ISO 400: Amanda Rivkin Talks About Photojournalism Internationally

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“In this episode of ISO 400, we hear from Amanda Rivkin, an American photojournalist currently based in Chicago who has a wealth of international experience, having worked in places like Azerbaijan, Serbia, the Czech Republic, Poland and Turkey. She’s been published in a wide variety of publications, including The New York Times, Le Monde and Newsweek among others. She has a deep understanding of storytelling and an eye for subtlety that you don’t often find in news photographs.” View Julius‘ blog post and watch the video on The Phoblographer.

Voice of America (VOA) Azeri Language Service: “I Admire the Courage of Khadija.” [Interview]

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Yesterday via e-mail I gave an interview to Voice of America (VOA) Azeri language service journalist Emil Quilyev. The full interview in Azerbaijani can be found on the Voice of America website. Below is the unedited original, without translation which also appears on the website of Radio Azadliq, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Azerbaijani language service. VOA: There have been some recent developments in Khadija Ismayil’s case. Nothing major. However, according to her lawyer Fariz Namazli, the accusation of disseminating state secrets have been lifted. What do you make of these trial proceedings? Amanda Rivkin: I do not know enough about Azerbaijani trial law to comment on the particulars. My guess is that the state has come under tremendous pressure from international organizations over this case and slight developments can be used by the government, primarily for external purposes, to show Khadija is being given something resembling “fair treatment” under the law. Of course I believe this case is entirely political and based on her investigations into the president’s family’s businesses in Azerbaijan and their various …

*InstArchive* on Instagram

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I’m trying something new because I’m American and tradition is boring we are made to think/believe/made to think is make believe. Everyday on my Instagram (@amandarivkin) I am posting a new image from my archive that is paired with a bit of “on this day in world history”. It’s how I’m taking it to the streets, building the ol’ personal brand, sharing my love of history, and finding meaning in my own work. It’s only a few days old but already we’ve been to Davenport, Iowa; Baku, Azerbaijan; Reyhanli, Turkey and today Spotsylvania, Virginia. Czech it out! MAY 9: On May 9, 2012, Obama announced his support for gay marriage in a television interview with Robin Roberts. In this image from my archive, witness Connie Fuller, 39, takes a picture of Rock Island, Illinois couple (l-r) Curtis Harris, 50, and Daren Adkisson, 39, after they picked up their marriage license first thing in the morning at the Scott County Recorder’s Office the first day same sex weddings are legal across Iowa in Davenport, Iowa on …

Aerial Photographs

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The question of aerial photography came up in a meeting today, so I went looking through my archives for a few samples. They are a few years old but from such interesting and/or beautiful places, I felt like sharing them here. Post-script, February 5: Coincidentally, yesterday was all about helicopters. Who hasn’t misremembered that time they flew in a helicopter that wasn’t hit by an RPG? I certainly don’t misremember anything of the sort happening in any of these helicopter journeys. I did refuse a helicopter elsewhere in Slovakia though due to wind conditions and the fact that I detected the smell of slivovitz on the pilot. No picture is worth a life and no lie is worth a lifetime of credibility-building within your field and among the greater public.