Panorama: Eurovision's dirty secret

[Star]

On at 9pm tonight if anyone is interested!

With just days to go to the final of this year's Eurovision Song Contest, Panorama has been undercover inside its hosts Azerbaijan, to discover the extraordinary truth about this secretive country and its approach to the world's most watched non-sporting event.

Reporter Paul Kenyon finds out how the contest has been used as a tool of intimidation: viewers have been interrogated for voting for the nation's long-term enemy, Armenia; a protest singer has been told to flee before Eurovision or he will be thrown in jail; and dozens have had their homes bulldozed to make way for the Eurovision event itself.

The US embassy in Baku has compared the ruling family to the Mafia. The regime has held onto power through a combination of rigged elections, jailing opponents, and by irregular control of the country's vast oil wealth. So, why did the organisers of the world's best well-loved music event agree to host it in Azerbaijan?

[Star]

Oooh, on now sorry, not 9pm!

[COB]

Viewers in Scotland are getting a thing about the Lockerbie man (dead) instead

[Tinu]

Will this become available online?

[COB]

It'll be on iPlayer later on, I think it normally takes a few hours though.

[Donna Winter]

BAN THIS SICK FILTH

NOW EUROVISION KILLS BABIES

[Star]

[Tinu]

Media selection request failed =/

[Agnetha]

I'm sure Eurovision has killed before.

[Star]

I'm sure Eurovision has killed before.

Donna Winter sacrifices a rubbish gai every year in honour of eurovision.

[VoR]

What a coward the head of the EBU is.

[Queen of the Bay]

Svante?

[Madison]

I've been saying it for years. Azerbaijan is evil.

[TurnerPrize]

As Azerbaijan's official moopy sweepstake delegate i would just like to say that all allegations are filthy lies spread by western pigs.

[Star]

Shut it you gay animal.

[VoR]

What other countries could throw up major issues if they hosted?

Belarus obviously... What's Moldova like?

[COB]

Parts of Russia have passed some rather DRACONIAN anti-gay laws recently, not that they were particularly great before

[Madison]

What other countries could throw up major issues if they hosted?

Belarus obviously... What's Moldova like?

Turkey should have.

[VoR]

What happened with Turkey? Was it all swept under the carpet?

[Apocalypt_flyer]

Turkey was hosted in Istanbul. Had it been in Ankara things would've been entirely different. That's at least my take on things.

[Penelope]

Albania could throw up a few issues.

[Beverley]

YEAH. ITS ONLY THE MUSLIM ONES

Lets forget the HR abuses and level of LGBT (in)tolerance that pervades ACROSS Eastern Europe, like former hosts Ukraine, Latvia, Russia, Estonia, for STARTERS.

And nobody gets GAY BASHED in Western Europe do they?

[Penelope]

I think everyone acknowledged how SHIT the 2009 contest was for human rights what with the pride parade getting broken up by police and all! I don't think anybody's DENYING that there's homophobia in western Europe, but you didn't exactly get these sorts of problems in Düsseldorf.

[Penelope]

Georgia would be quite bad too thinking about it. I remember reading somewhere that a poll found about 90% of the population there would disown their children if they turned out to be gay, or something like that...

[Diddy]

YEAH. ITS ONLY THE MUSLIM ONES

who said that!?

Or were you going to say it anyway?

[VoR]

Yeah we've all said Russia were as bad, and the press did pick up on that too. That makes this even worse in many ways because clearly the EBU have taken no serious steps to address the issue.

I don't think the issue is religious, even though it's obviously tied in. It's cultural. Azerbaijan has a culture of corruption and human rights abuses. The fact that they're primarily a Muslim nation should have absolutely no bearing on this. They want to be part of the EBU, they should be adhering to the same standards as the rest of us.

[VoR]

In fact I'm SURE I said the same thing when people were defending Russia because it has a stronger orthodox Christian culture than most Western countries.

[Beverley]

I already made my point in the other thread. I object to the idea that this is solely an Azerbaijani problem. It smacks of racism to me, that the media has decided that Azerbaijan's HR/LGBT rights needs to be addressed and attacked and that the EBU must be involved in tackling this. And I think that a number of people on this forum are wrong to be taken with this agenda. Why was this never brought up in other places? If the EBU's mandate is peace and democrazy and human rights for all blah blah, then why has it never tackled this before and why has it never been asked to? Even bringing this SOLELY to an LGBT rights perspective, it is across EASTERN europe where Pride marches have been banned or they have taken place in GATED PARKS, to verbal abuse from neo-fascists standing around them (LATVIA). Azerbaijan's human rights adherence SUCKS, but why make this about Azerbaijan? Is it because it isn't European? Is it because its a MUSLIM country? Lets be clear about the kind of prejudice that is motivating the discussion, because it sure as hell, hasn't been brought up by the media, out of a genuine concern for the rights of the citizenship within the country.

[Penelope]

I think in Georgia actually the Patriarch (Pope equivalent) of the Georgian Orthodox Church came out and pressured for someone to be kicked off of Big Brother when they came out as gay on there, and the producers duly did so...

[Penelope]

I already made my point in the other thread. I object to the idea that this is solely an Azerbaijani problem. It smacks of racism to me, that the media has decided that Azerbaijan's HR/LGBT rights needs to be addressed and attacked and that the EBU must be involved in tackling this. And I think that a number of people on this forum are wrong to be taken with this agenda. Why was this never brought up in other places? If the EBU's mandate is peace and democrazy and human rights for all blah blah, then why has it never tackled this before and why has it never been asked to? Even bringing this SOLELY to an LGBT rights perspective, it is across EASTERN europe where Pride marches have been banned or they have taken place in GATED PARKS, to verbal abuse from neo-fascists standing around them (LATVIA). Azerbaijan's human rights adherence SUCKS, but why make this about Azerbaijan? Is it because it isn't European? Is it because its a MUSLIM country? Lets be clear about the kind of prejudice that is motivating the discussion, because it sure as hell, hasn't been brought up by the media, out of a genuine concern for the rights of the citizenship within the country.

I think the main reason it's being brought up by the media is probably because Azerbaijan's hosting Eurovision this year and these other countries aren't.

[VoR]

I already made my point in the other thread. I object to the idea that this is solely an Azerbaijani problem. It smacks of racism to me, that the media has decided that Azerbaijan's HR/LGBT rights needs to be addressed and attacked and that the EBU must be involved in tackling this. And I think that a number of people on this forum are wrong to be taken with this agenda. Why was this never brought up in other places? If the EBU's mandate is peace and democrazy and human rights for all blah blah, then why has it never tackled this before and why has it never been asked to? Even bringing this SOLELY to an LGBT rights perspective, it is across EASTERN europe where Pride marches have been banned or they have taken place in GATED PARKS, to verbal abuse from neo-fascists standing around them (LATVIA). Azerbaijan's human rights adherence SUCKS, but why make this about Azerbaijan? Is it because it isn't European? Is it because its a MUSLIM country? Lets be clear about the kind of prejudice that is motivating the discussion, because it sure as hell, hasn't been brought up by the media, out of a genuine concern for the rights of the citizenship within the country.

I see your point, but surely the reason it's being raised now is that they've won the right to host a major Western competition and the eyes of the world are on them.

Like I said, Russia got JUST as much flack at the time. The sad thing is nothing was done about it. I don't think not talking about it out of some bizarre idea of fairness is a constructive way of thinking at all. This is an opportunity to look at Azerbaijan and put pressure on them to reform. I see nothing wrong with supporting that.

[Beverley]

I completely agree with the principle of what VoR is saying, but the way this whole thing is being handled is completely distasteful to ME. Although it was brought up in Russia, I do think that a lot of the consernation was suppressed for a number of reasons, that don't exist for Azerbaijan.

[VoR]

I completely agree with the principle of what VoR is saying, but the way this whole thing is being handled is completely distasteful to ME. Although it was brought up in Russia, I do think that a lot of the consernation was suppressed for a number of reasons, that don't exist for Azerbaijan.

Yes but I think those reasons are primarily that Russia is too big and scary and powerful to realistically be changed by a barrage of negative publicity, not necessarily that they're white Christians.

[Beverley]

Personally, I also don't believe that the EBU pressurising a country to reform is likely to yield the most success, so I have massive doubts about the necessity for the EBU to engage with that. MAX, what is the EBU going to do? Stop them from participating in Eurovision?

[Penelope]

If anything I think Russia will end up having gotten more flack than Azerbaijan will get. It was mentioned a LOT at the time that the parades had been disrupted in Russia (Graham Norton even mentioned it a fair bit in the commentary that year), whereas there simply hasn't been an equivalent event this year that really would bring it all into focus, aside from the hacking of ESCtoday - which even then could be ascribed to a lone wolf and doesn't exactly capture the imagination as much as gays getting beaten up in the streets by police did.

[Beverley]

Yes but I think those reasons are primarily that Russia is too big and scary and powerful to realistically be changed by a barrage of negative publicity, not necessarily that they're white Christians.

But I think that actually, Azerbaijan is more similar than different to Russia, but differential treatment is being applied.

[VoR]

MAX, what is the EBU going to do? Stop them from participating in Eurovision?

YES. I know that's not going to topple the government, but for a country that is very keen to be seen as modern and engaged with the west, it'd be a major embarassment. I don't understand why they've been allowed to compete when they flagrantly break the rules. Even ignoring the LGBT/human rights issues, the situation with Armenia should be enough to keep them out.

I have misgivings about Israel being able to compete as well TBH, but obviously that's a WHOLE other can of worms....

[Penelope]

Personally, I also don't believe that the EBU pressurising a country to reform is likely to yield the most success, so I have massive doubts about the necessity for the EBU to engage with that. MAX, what is the EBU going to do? Stop them from participating in Eurovision?

I don't think there's anything the EBU can do about Azerbaijan now - it's far too late in the day for that - but I think there should be a few criteria that the EBU should attach as prerequisites for a country to be able to host Eurovision in the future. A free press, no political prisoners, free protests, free and fair elections, safeguards for LGBT visitors (and those of other minorities) etc.

[Beverley]

Of course it looks like I have a massive bee in my bonnet about the whole race and religion thing, which is untrue, but I couldn't care less. What I wanted to bring to this whole issue was a plurality, discussing the motivations behind it and ensuring people realise that there is a great deal of hypocrisy taking place within this discourse on Azerbaijan's human rights. I have ONLY read of how appalling the whole thing is, which to me, is a massively anaemic perspective on the EBU and Human Rights engagement and more broadly speaking, the narrative of LGBT Rights across Eurovision participants. I strongly believe that there are softer forms of diplomacy that would yield far better results than what is currently being done - because its so easy to reject on the basis that it DOES appear hypocritical, racist and non-constructive. Do I really believe that the EBU can make the Azeri dictator soften? NO.

[Beverley]

I have misgivings about Israel being able to compete as well TBH, but obviously that's a WHOLE other can of worms....

But d'yaknowwhatImean - PRECISELY!