Qıy Vaar! previously reported on the criminal case against Röyal Ismayilov, who is accused of murdering a gay man in Baku. We would now like to update that report: according to information we have received from community members, the person identified as “Orkhan Umayev” in court records was, in fact, a trans woman named Aydan.
In February, we had already published a post about Aydan’s murder and appealed to the community for further information about her. At the time, although we did not have detailed information about the circumstances of her death, we had received reports that information about the murder was being kept out of the public eye and that the case had not been covered by the media because one of Aydan’s close relatives was a government official. We also mentioned this in our original post.
New information from community members now indicates that Aydan, whose case we were seeking information about in February, was the same person identified as O. U. in the court proceedings. According to community members, her relatives had attempted to conceal her trans identity and the name she used. As a result, reports on the murder did not identify her as a trans woman.
