Azerbaijan beats up journalists, jails political opponents and bulldozes people's homes to build shopping malls, according to the latest resolution by the European Parliament.
It is run "in a manner similar to the feudalism found in Europe during the Middle Ages ... with general agreement among leading families to divide the spoils," according to
Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's Foreign Affairs Editor. He has been writing about foreign and security affairs for EUobserver since 2005. He is Polish but grew up in the UK. He has also written for The Guardian, The Telegraph, and The Times of London.