Azeri opposition party official denies mass exodus from party

Text of report by Azerbaijani news agency Turan on 19th May
Baku, 18th May: The chairman of the Sharur District department
of the Musavat Party, Sabuhi Maharramli, has denied a statement
by Faramaz Allahverdiyev, former member of Musavat Party
supreme council, that 90 Musavat members in Sharur District had
switched to the People's Front of Azerbaijan Party [PFAP].
Maharramli told a press conference today that this figure
had been exaggerated ten-fold. Nine people who had switched to
the PFAP were Allahrverdiyev's relatives. He also noted that
Allahverdiyev and two other members of the Musavat Party were
deprived of their membership on 24th April for violating party
regulations and cooperating with the security service bodies.
Maharramli thinks that pressure by the authorities on Musavat
was behind all this. The police in Nakhichevan had used threats
to try and force 70 Musavat members to leave the party but
failed to succeed in their aims, he said.