Aeromars

Every country needs its whistleblowers. They are crucial to a healthy society. The employee who, in the public interest, has the independence of judgment and the personal courage to challenge malpractice or illegality is a kind of public hero. 

Whistleblowing is relevant in the UK now more than ever, as the recent wave of high profile cover-ups and the relentless clamp downs on truth tellers has shown. The Hillsborough Inquiry, the string of serious problems in the NHS and related health agencies, the recently revealed Ministry of Defence internal document gagging whistleblowers from revealing wrongdoing to their own MPs. The list of examples goes on and on. They illustrate exactly why we need whistleblowers in society in the first place.

Moreover, as Robert Francis QC reported, in any huge and bureaucratic organisation like the NHS, whistleblowers are far more likely to be resented than respected, as Helene Donnelly, the nurse who protested about the failings in care at Mid Staffs. Far from having their names embossed on a roll of honour, Francis found that the doctors and nurses and other NHS staff who reported their anxieties about failings in patient care had been shunned, suspended or even sacked by hospital bosses. Many were left struggling to find a new job. Some have been driven to contemplate suicide.

In 2014, a lawyer working for HMRC found that his boss, David Hartnett, was having "sweetheart" sessions with Goldman Sachs allowing the bank to avoid £10m in interest on tax. He thought this out of order and did what the rulebook said. Under the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA) he wrote privately to the national audit office and to a committee of parliament. When HMRC found out, it went berserk. Using the anti-terrorist Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA), it had his belongings, emails and phone calls searched. He was suspended and left "a broken man". He lost his job.

In same year, the policeman who blew the whistle on the Metropolitan police's massaging of crime figures was driven to resign, citing his "treatment as a result of making disclosures in good faith and in the public interest". He had been placed under police investigation for "misconduct". 

The reality is that all organisations hate having their inner workings exposed, the more so if it incurs collective odium and risks jobs. The wagons gather into a circle to defend a wounded superior. More to the point, whistleblowers don't have to be employees; they can be members of a school or religious community organisation, for example. A good example of this is the whistleblowers who stepped forward to confirm incidents of paedophilia in religious institutions over the past decade.

Governments are now also frequently turning technology inward to spy on employees and others in an effort to thwart whistleblowing to the media. So while whistleblowing has become easier, spying technology has also made it riskier to do online.

Whistleblowing tends to go hand in hand with coverups. The independent panel investigating the Hillsborough tragedy in which 96 football fans died found that police had not only lied about what happened, they had deliberately altered evidence of those who tried to tell the truth. Public outrage at the cover up was so immense prime minister David Cameron had to apologise to the victims' families.

In the United States, whistleblowers such as Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and Jor Darby forced to choose between allegiance to the flag and uniform, and loyalty to the ideals the flag is supposed to represent and the uniform is supposed to defend, they chose the latter. Their defiance stems from the fact that, in acting as they have, they don't believe they've let down America. They believe they had to act because America was letting itself down.

It's clear whistleblowing is an important part of a participatory democracy, yet many still remain puzzled about what value governments and legal scholars place on it. Time will tell what influence cases such as the NHS and Wikileaks will have on this value, but one thing seems likely – despite facing often iron-fisted measures, whistleblowers are increasingly winning public support.

1. Azerbaijan contains more than half of the world's mud volcanoes.

2. Azerbaijan is also known as “The Land of Fire”.

3. Azerbaijan is the home of mugham, ashiq and meykhana music genres.

4. By the beginning of the 20th century, Azerbaijan was supplying almost half of the world's oil.

5. Karabakh horse is the national animal of Azerbaijan.

6. Gaval Dash in Gobustan National Park is a rock, which makes a tambourine-like sound when it is hit in different points.

7. Kalaghai is a traditional Azerbaijani women's headgear. Its production and the wearing were included in the list of intangible cultural heritage UNESCO.

8. Buta ornament is widely used in Azerbaijan: on carpets, textiles and decoration of buildings.

9. Carpet weaving is the most broadly spread classic type of handicraft in Azerbaijan.

10. Most widely used spice in Azerbaijan is saffron, although fennel, bay leaf, coriander, anise and caraway seeds are also popular ways to enhance flavour.

11. The pomegranate symbolises unity in Azerbaijani folklore.

12. Founded in 1906, Azerbaijani weekly magazine Molla Nasreddin was revolutionary for its time, bravely ridiculing clerics and criticising the political elite as well as the Russian Tsar and the Shah of Persia.

13. According to Norwegian adventurer and ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl's hypothesis, Scandinavian ancestry can be traced to Gobustan region of Azerbaijan.

14. Neft Dashlary ("Oil Rocks") established in 1947, was included into Guinness Book of Records as the world's first offshore oil platform.

15. Singer Rashid Behbudov's repertoire includes 30 songs about Baku.

16. Azerbaijan is the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2011. The country also managed to win Türkvizyon Song Contest 2014.

17. Most popular sports in Azerbaijan are football, wrestling and chess while older people still enjoy the traditional game of backgammon.

18. Azerbaijan is the first majority Muslim country to give suffrage to women.

19. Karabakh is a word of Turkic and Persian origin meaning "black garden".

20. Azerbaijan, is home to the last Soviet collective farm and a group of dissident Christians called the Molokans, who were forced out of Russia by Catherine the Great.

21. Kamil Jalilov's recording of the song with balaban was included on the Voyager Golden Record, attached to the Voyager spacecraft as representing mugham, only Azerbaijani song included among many cultural achievements of humanity.

22. In Alevism, Ismail I is seen as a religious figure, and a moral spiritual leader.

23. Nakhchivan is an autonomous republic within Azerbaijan.

24. Uzeyir Hajibayov's "Leyli and Majnun" is first opera staged in the Middle East.

25. Chingiz Abdullayev is Azerbaijan’s best-selling author. As of 2015, 27.5 million copies of his books have been printed in 29 languages around the world.

26. The Treaty of Turkmanchai, in 1828, divided Azerbaijan's territory between Persia (now Iran) and Russia.

27. By the beginning of the 20th century, there were over 13,000 German colonists in Azerbaijan. They founded towns like Tovuz (Traubenfeld), Shamkir (Annenfeld) and Helenendorf (Goygol).

28. Religious proselytizing is illegal in Azerbaijan.

29. The oldest salt mine in Azerbaijan is over 6500 years old.

30. Baku is also known as the “City of Winds”.

31. Ganja is Azerbaijan’s second biggest city.

32. Azerbaijan is the birthplace of the Chovgan, a forerunner of polo.

33. There are approximately 27 million Azerbaijanis (or of Azerbaijani descent) worldwide.

34. There's a small town in Azerbaijan called "Dashkasan," meaning "stone cutter."

35. Alim Qasimov won UNESCO Music Prize in 1999, one of the highest international accolades for music.

36. Chess is a compulsory subject in schools.

37. Azerbaijan abolished death penalty in 1998.

38. Azerbaijan's first telecommunications satellite has been launched into orbit in 2013.

39. Azeri is short for “Azerbaijani”.

40. The first European Games held in Baku.

41. Sheki, Nakhchivan and Ganja are three of Azerbaijan's oldest centres of trade.

42. Petroleum spas in Naftalan use crude oil baths to treat arthritis and skin conditions.

43. In 1942, Adolf Hitler's birthday cake was adorned by a map of the Caspian Sea with the word "Baku" spelled out with chocolate letters. After eating the cake, Hitler said: "Unless we get Baku oil, the war is lost".

44. Azerbaijan became part of the USSR at the end of 1922.

45. Famous names from Azerbaijani literature include: Nizami Ganjavi, Fuzuli and Imadaddin Nasimi.

46. The city of the Aghdam is only ghost town in Azerbaijan.

47. The number of words in the Azerbaijani language is: 111, 563. This is the estimate by the Azerbaijan Institute of Linguistics on January 1, 2015.

48. Azerbaijan contains 9 out of the 11 climatic zones.

49. The official religion of Azerbaijan is Islam.

50. People from Baku are called Bakuvians.

Top 10 interesting facts about Azerbaijan. Part 2

1. The pomegranate symbolises unity in Azerbaijani folklore.
2. Founded in 1906, Azerbaijani weekly magazine Molla Nasreddin was revolutionary for its time, bravely ridiculing clerics and criticising the political elite as well as the Russian Tsar and the Shah of Persia.
3. According to Norwegian adventurer and ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl's hypothesis, Scandinavian ancestry can be traced to  Gobustan region of Azerbaijan.
4. Neft Dashlary ("Oil Rocks") established in 1947, was included into Guinness Book of Records as the world's first offshore oil platform.
5. Singer Rashid Behbudov's repertoire includes 30 songs about Baku.
6. Azerbaijan is the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2011. The country also managed to win Türkvizyon Song Contest 2014.
7. Wrestling has been traditionally regarded as Azerbaijan's national sport.
8. Azerbaijan is the first majority Muslim country to give suffrage to women.
9. Alim Gasimov was awarded the International Music Council-UNESCO Music Prize in 1999, one of the highest international accolades for music.
10. Azerbaijan, is home to the last Soviet collective farm and a group of dissident Christians called the Molokans, who were forced out of Russia by Catherine the Great.

If the world was made of gold, people would have to die so that someone could get handful of it.