A Senior Tory boasted about lobbying the Government on behalf of the corrupt regime Azerbaijan - his “good friends” - it can be revealed.
Bob Blackman, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Azerbaijan, said on a podcast: “On a regular basis I put down positions on behalf of our good friends in Azerbaijan.”
He has been on seven trips worth tens of thousands of pounds to the country since 2011.
And in his role as head of the APPG, he has also been given briefings by high level figures, including Azerbaijani MP Javanshir Feyziyev, in 2020 and 2021.
Corruption is understood to be high in Azerbaijan, and occurs at all levels of government by some members.
Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) - given on a scale of 0 - for highly corrupt - to 100, for very clean - gave Azerbaijan a score of 30.
Since 2019, Azerbaijan's government has undertaken a campaign of prosecuting corrupt officials - with high ranking central and local government officials, cabinet ministers and high-ranking military officers coming under the spotlight.
The investigations have included charges of bribery, abuse of power and fraud.
In 2017 it emerged a so-called "Azerbaijani laundromat" had operated among the country's ruling elite - who used a secret slush fund to pay off local politicians, buy luxury goods and launder money.
The website openDemocracy last night (FRI) revealed that in the last 18 months, Mr Blackman tabled four pro-regime motions in the house, and written to two foreign secretaries, urging them to strengthen ties with Azerbaijan and condemn its opponent Armenia.
Apart from one instance, the MP did not declare his interests.
He declared a relevant interest before tabling his first motion in July 2020, noting “acts of aggression by Armenia” and calling on the UK government to “condemn [Armenia’s] recent actions.”
In October 2020, Mr Blackman tabled a second motion, urging the UK Government to "condemn Armenia for blatantly violating" a ceasefire agreement with Azerbaijan.
He failed to declare an interest when tabling the motion, despite having taken a trip to Baku in February that year, paid for by the Azerbaijani Parliament.
He did, however declare an interest when asking a question about a territorial dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the commons later the same day.
The following week he wrote to then-Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, repeating word-for-word a statement issued previously by Azerbaijan's foreign policy adviser, Hikmat Hajiyev.
Mr Blackman neither declared a relevant interest in his letter to Raab nor made clear the source of his claims.
In November, he tabled a third motion, “to show solidarity with the Azerbaijani people who have been resilient by publicly demonstrating in such huge numbers in support of their right to live in peace in their historical lands”.
Mr Blackman declared no relevant interest on the motion.
He took a further trip to Baku, paid for by the Azerbaijani Parliament, in November last year (2021).
Several weeks later, he tabled a fourth early day motion on Azerbaijan and Armenia relations that included a line expressing “support for the British companies that are involved in the reconstruction of the liberated lands in the Nagorno-Karabakh”.
The MP again declared no relevant interest.
All of Mr Blackman’s trips to Azerbaijan were properly registered with Commons authorities. His chairmanship of the APPG is also properly registered.
But Commons rules require members to declare registered interests “whenever they are relevant,” including when asking questions in the chamber, submitting motions and speaking to ministers.
Since Mr Blackman became MP for Harrow East in 2010, he and his staff have taken trips to Azerbaijan worth more than £23,000 in total.
The three most recent – in November 2021, February 2020, and September 2018 – were funded by either Azerbaijan’s London embassy or the Azerbaijani parliament.
Some trips were funded by the European Azerbaijan Society, a UK-based lobbying group.
Mr Blackman’s first motion, tabled in July 2020, was made the same day he and the Azerbaijan APPG met with Mr Feyziyev and Azerbaijan’s ambassador to the UK, Tahir Taghizadeh.
Shortly afterward, Mr Blackman spoke candidly about his work as chair of the APPG on the “Eye to Eye” podcast.
“One of the things that happens, I’m afraid, in these types of conflicts is that [...] whoever gets the best propaganda tends to grab the attention of the listeners and the viewers,” he said.
“And in this regard I’ve been fed the information through the Azerbaijan embassy in the UK – so they’ve been very, very helpful, very, very proactive from the word go when the hostilities began on 12 July.”
He added: “I was getting information straight away, and that’s why I tabled the early day motion and why we did as much media as we could.”
openDemocracy has also obtained a letter Bob Blackman sent to the foreign secretary, Liz Truss, about a visit he made to Azerbaijan in November 2021.
In the December-dated letter, released to openDemocracy after a Freedom of Information request, the MP urged Truss to update the Azerbaijan APPG “on what steps the government is taking to strengthen trade, economic and political ties with Azerbaijan”.
The MP did not mention in the letter that the recent trip had been paid for and organised by the Azerbaijani parliament. Nor did he draw the foreign secretary’s attention to his register of interests, as the rules require.
Mr Blackman said: “I’m not making any comment at all, whatsoever.”
He added that there were “at least two things wrong” in the allegations put to him by the Mirror - but declined to explain what they were.
He added: “As far as I’m concerned, everything I’ve ever done for Azerbaijan has been properly declared.”
