Azerbaijan removes statue of Mubarak
BAKU – Authorities in Azerbaijan have heeded opposition calls to dismantle a statue of ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Wary of any association with Mubarak's disgraced regime, authorities ordered the statue removed late on Tuesday from its spot in Khyrdalan, a small town just outside the capital, Baku.
The four-year-old statue -- one of the rare tributes to Mubarak outside Egypt -- was replaced by a rather crude depiction of a cross-legged Egyptian scribe.
A school in Khyrdalan named after Mubarak's wife Suzanna was also re-dubbed "Egyptian school."
Whether President Ilham Aliyev has anything to do with the town's "de-Mubarakization" remains unclear. A local official, Fikrat Orujov, said only that the statue was dismantled to reflect the change of leadership in Egypt.
The statue had become somewhat of a liability in the wake of Egypt's pro-democracy revolt.
Just days before Mubarak was ousted in February, a group of Azerbaijani youth activists had gathered at the monument to voice their solidarity with Egyptian protesters.