Leyla Yunus
| Leyla Yunus | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
December 21, 1955 Baku, Azerbaijan |
| Other names | Leyla Yunusova |
| Occupation | human rights activist |
| Organization | Institute of Peace and Democracy |
| Known for | civil society engagement, helping citizens affected by forced evictions in Baku |
Leyla Islam qizi Yunusova (née Valiyeva; born 21 December 1955 in Baku), better known as Leyla Yunus, is an Azerbaijani human rights activist who serves as the director of Institute of Peace and Democracy, a human rights organisation. She is particularly known for her work helping citizens affected by forced evictions in Baku, on whose behalf she organized several small protests. In July 2014, the Azerbaijani authorities jailed Yunus under allegations of spying for Armenia, which are charges are widely regarded as dubious. After being sentenced to 8.5 years in jail on 13 August 2015, Leyla Yunus was released on grounds of her deteriorating health on 9 December 2015, with a court converting her sentence into a suspended one.
Yunus is a historian by training and wrote her dissertation on "English-Russian Rivalry on the Caspian Sea and Azerbaijan in the First Part of the 18th Century".
In the last years of the Soviet Union, Yunus was active in pro-reform circles. In 1988, she founded the "Popular Front of Azerbaijan in Support of Perestroika", together with a small group of moderate intellectuals. Early on, this Popular Front of Azerbaijan was deliberately modeled on the example of the Popular Front of Estonia.
By January 1990, Yunus together with Zardusht Alizadeh formed the Social Democratic Party, with the aim of establishing a moderate political voice. In April 1990, Yunus published an essay "The Responsibilities of a Politician", arguing for a democratic middle course and rejecting both extreme nationalism and the violent repressions of the Soviet regime.
During the hostilities in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 1992-1993, Yunus served as the Vice-Minister of Defence and Chief of the Information Analytical Centre of Ministry of Defence.
Subsequently, Yunus has worked with civil society activists in both Azerbaijan and Armenia to call for peace. She and her husband Arif, a historian, are known for actively pursuing reconciliation with Armenia. In 1998, she participated in the European Consultation of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation's Women Peacemakers Program (WPP), together with an Armenian counterpart, on active nonviolence.
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