Gulargate

Gulargate was a 2012–2013 political corruption scandal in Azerbaijan involving civil servants and government officials of various levels, serving in positions as high as the National Assembly of Azerbaijan and the Presidential Administration. It flared up on 25 September 2012 after Azerbaijani lawyer and former university rector Elshad Abdullayev (now residing in France) posted a hidden camera video on YouTube showing his meeting with Member of Parliament Gular Ahmadova negotiating a bribe to secure a seat in the National Assembly for Abdullayev in the 2005 parliamentary election. The scandal widened after a series of similar videos involving other officials and other cases of corruption were posted by Abdullayev at later dates, followed by sackings, arrests and deaths of some of those who appeared in the videos.^[1]

The name "Gulargate" derives from the first name of now former MP Gular Ahmadova who appeared in the very first video. It was coined by Azerbaijani media on the day following the release of the first video^[2] by analogy with the Watergate scandal of the 1970s. The term was later republished and used by English-language media outlets^[3] and in the corruption report of the PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights.^[1] Despite the term coinage, most videos are related to the kidnapping of Elshad Abdullayev's brother Mahir Abdullayev and not to Gular Ahmadova.