VZCZCXYZ1925
PP RUEHWEB

DE RUEHKB #0799/01 2791325
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 061325Z OCT 09
FM AMEMBASSY BAKU
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 1847
INFO RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES PRIORITY
RUEHAK/AMEMBASSY ANKARA PRIORITY 3575
RUEHSI/AMEMBASSY TBILISI PRIORITY 1887
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHDC PRIORITY
RUCPDOC/DEPT OF COMMERCE WASHDC PRIORITY UNCLAS BAKU 000799 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
COMMERCE FOR D.STARKS 
EEB/CBA FOR T.GILMAN 
LABOR FOR C.CASTRO AND L.BERMUDEZ 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: 
SUBJECT: AZERBAIJAN: CHILD LABOR SHIFTING FROM COTTON TO 
OTHER SECTORS 
 
 1. (SBU) SUMMARY: Following the release of the Labor 
Department's report on International Child Labor, which 
documented the presence of child labor in Azerbaijan's cotton 
industry, Embassy Baku spoke with local NGOs in Baku, Berda, 
and Imishli, as well as Baku representatives of the ILO and 
UNICEF, to learn more about child labor in today's 
Azerbaijan. The groups report that while child labor is 
commonly seen in both Baku and the countryside, the vast 
majority of children involved are either working for or 
alongside their families. The groups further report that as 
the cotton sector continues to decline, child labor is moving 
to other sectors, including other crops, restaurants, car 
repair workshops, and what ILO referred to as the "worst 
forms," namely drugs, prostitution, and human trafficking. 
End Summary. 
 
UNICEF, ILO Comment on Child Labor 
---------------------------------- 
 
 2. (U) According to UNICEF statistics, 13 percent of all 
children in Azerbaijan aged between 5 and 15 are engaged in 
some type of work, and 0.3 percent are engaged in paid work. 
Azerbaijani law allows 14 year-olds to work without parental 
consent; 15 year-olds do not require parental consent. 
 
 3. (SBU) ILO Representative Yashar Hamzayev reports that in 
hotels and restaurants throughout Azerbaijan children work as 
waiters, and that customers find this normal. Hamzayev says 
that he recently asked a waiter in Quba his age and the 
waiter said he was ten. Hamzayev says the families have 
their children work because they need the income, while some 
employers prefer children because of the lower labor cost. 
COMMENT: Embassy staff have often seen children who clearly 
appear to be under the age of 18 working in restaurants, but 
have not personally seen children who are obviously under the 
age of 14. End Comment. 
 
 4. (SBU) Hamzayev says that cotton is still the top employer 
of children in Azerbaijan, even though falling cotton prices 
have caused the sector to collapse. Mazahir Gasimov, Deputy 
Head of the Berda Executive Authority, told EconOff that his 
region, the top cotton-producer in Azerbaijan, has seen 
production fall from 32,000 hectares in Soviet times to 1,700 
hectares today (a fall of 95 percent). Hamzayev says the 
number two employer of child labor is the services sector, 
primarily restaurants and car repair workshops. 
 
 5. (SBU) Hamzayev said that the "worst forms" of child labor 
(drug sales, prostitution, and human trafficking) employ a 
small but growing number of children, and that sector has 
become substantially more organized since 2002. He said that 
he has "personally seen" children selling drugs in the 
streets of Baku, and that dealers prefer to let the children 
do the sales because they do not want to be caught by the 
police. He also said that in some cases children are sent to 
resorts in Dubai and Turkey and promised jobs in the 
hospitality industry, but on arrival are sent into 
prostitution. COMMENT: The embassy has no evidence of such 
trafficking from other sources, which causes us to suspect 
the number of children trafficked to other countries is low. 
End Comment. 
 
 6. (SBU) Munir Mammadov of UNICEF agreed that child labor 
in Azerbaijan "is a problem, but it is not researched or 
studied well." He says that UNICEF was not able to do a 
report this year due to a lack of funds, but hopes to do one 
in the future (possibly this year). Mammadov said that he 
has seen children working in shops, restaurants, bazaars, and 
public transit in Baku, but a "good sign is that the GOAJ is 
accepting this as a problem." Mammadov said that the GOAJ is 
ready to sign international protocols for "prestige," but 
does not always follow through on enforcement and seldom 
gives reports to international bodies. Mammadov said that 
most children working in rural areas are either working for 
or alongside their families, and that it is a matter of 
"survival" for families at the bottom of the economic ladder. 
 
Embassy Visits Berda, Imishli 
----------------------------------- 
 
 7. (SBU) EconOff traveled to Berda and Imishli in 
 
mid-September, at the start of the cotton harvest, and 
witnessed child labor in the fields (Berda and Imishli are in 
the heart of Azerbaijan's cotton-producing area.) When asked 
why he did not go to school, one boy (who said he was 17) 
responded, "Why should I go to school? I will just sit there 
for no reason for two more years, and then I will come back 
to work here. I should start working now." In another 
field, Embassy staff photographed a girl who looked 
approximately ten years old working alongside older staff 
(one of whom appeared to be a relative), but then managers 
appeared and it became impossible to ask meaningful 
questions. (NOTE: A copy of this photo is available on 
request - send an unclass email to AriturkS@state.gov. End 
note.) 
 
 8. (SBU) One local NGO that had been monitoring child labor 
is now being shut down. Sadagat Gambarova, the Director of 
Labor Relations for the National Confederation of 
Entrepreneurs (known by its Azeri acronym ASK) says that her 
group has been taken over by Mammad Musayev (who is connected 
to the powerful Minister of Emergency Situations Kemaladdin 
Heydarov) and that Musayev has begun dismantling the 
organization. Gambarova said that in the last four years she 
has met with one thousand children, but she said "not all can 
be considered 'child labor,' because some just help their 
families for one or two hours a day, while others are removed 
from schools and appear psychologically damaged." 
 
 9. (SBU) Gambarova said that while large agro-producers like 
Azersun monitor their own staff and do not hire those under 
16, they still buy crops from the farms of families that 
employ their own children. "I traveled to the Southern 
regions of Azerbaijan, where Talysh is spoken as a first 
language, and although the schools teach in Azerbaijani, the 
children I meet do not speak Azerbaijani, which tells me they 
have not been to school." She closed by lamenting, "in 
Soviet times, there were penalties for not sending children 
to school, but now there are no mechanisms." 
 
 10. Elgiz Salahov, an attorney in Berda who works as the 
regional representative for ASK, said that his NGO "is being 
suffocated because we fought corruption - the authorities 
even came in here and took away my (ASK) stamp." The loss of 
the organization's stamp renders Salahov unable to register 
documents, which means his actions and decisions are 
considered unofficial and without any authority. Salahov 
said that ASK used to have 38 offices across the country, but 
will soon reduce that number to five, and will only maintain 
offices where they can be co-located with an Agrokredit bank, 
which he said was run by Mammad Musayev. "In one or two 
years, ASK will stop functioning, but I will go on," he said. 
 "The people in this town know me and need my legal services 
- I will continue to help them." Given the general GOAJ 
trend of harassing those who stand against corruption, it's 
unclear that Salahov would be able to continue offering such 
services indefinitely, or that he could be succeeded by a 
similar do-gooder when he retires. 
 
 11. COMMENT: It's unclear if a campaign against child labor 
would be tackling a problem or tackling a symptom. Rural 
schools throughout Azerbaijan suffer from poor infrastructure 
and poorly paid, unmotivated teachers. This year the GOAJ 
actually lowered the score required to enter secondary 
school, as not enough children reached the previously 
required score. If the children working in the cotton fields 
(or their parents) do not feel the local school is worth 
their time, it's hard to imagine an effective fight against 
child labor. At the same time, Sadagat Gambarova makes the 
point that penalties for not sending a child to school did 
seem to have an effect in Soviet times. It's not clear 
whether a stick would be more useful than a carrot in today's 
Azerbaijan, but it is clear that the GOAJ is not effectively 
implementing either sticks or carrots at this time. The 
problem only affects the poorest Azerbaijanis who do not 
benefit from the country's oil wealth - a slice of society 
that does not appear to be getting smaller, particularly in 
rural areas. End Comment. 

LU

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