Azerbaijani dictator secures 5th term

President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has been declared the winner of the 2024 Presidential election, with Aliyev reportedly receiving 4,577,693 votes (92.12%) and the second-place candidate reportedly receiving 2.17% of the vote. OSCE observers have stated that the election was not competitive and was held in a restrictive environment.

Ilham Aliyev

The OSCE observers also stated that "recent arrests of critical journalists have hindered the media from operating freely," and that there were "issues of secrecy of the vote, a lack of safeguards against multiple voting, indications of ballot stuffing". They also raised "serious questions about whether ballots were counted and reported honestly".

The election was held following the Azerbaijani offensive against Artsakh and the subsequent dissolution of the breakaway state. The offensive led to 100,617 ethnic Armenians fleeing from Artsakh to Armenia, which prompted international legal experts to accuse Azerbaijan of genocide.