Eurovision: Azerbaijan probes Russian no-vote

Sergey Lavrov was meeting with his counterpart from Azerbaijan to discuss an investigation into why the former Soviet republic appeared to give “nul points” to Russia during the contest in Malmo last Saturday.

Azerbaijan’s foreign minister, Elmar Mammadyarov, said his country’s mobile phone operators reported that Russia’s Dina Garipova came second in the local vote, which would have given her ten points. However, when the announcement was made on live television, there were no points for Russia.

Mr Lavrov called it “outrageous” and said the points were stolen from Ms Garipova.

Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev, has ordered an inquiry.

Voters and the official Azerbaijan jury gave strong backing to the Russian entry, the country’s officials claimed.

Camil Guliyev, head of the country’s state broadcaster, said the failure to give Russia any points was of serious concern.

He said: “We sincerely hope that this incident, possibly initiated by certain interest groups, will not cast a shadow over the brotherly relations of the Russian and Azerbaijani peoples.”

Azerbaijan, which hosted last year’s contest, has traditionally tried to maintain good relations with Moscow, though there have been tensions.

Ms Garipova finished fifth overall on Saturday, 17 points behind fourth-placed Norway, so ten points would not have made a difference in the ranking.

But Russians have been passionate about the pan-European contest for more than a decade. Dima Bilan’s win in 2008 was treated as a national triumph.

In Eurovision, votes compiled by national phone operators go to a TV broadcaster in each country, which presents the tally via a live video link with the country hosting the contest.

Azerbaijani television earlier lamented the “loss of the votes” but could not explain what actually happened.

Mr Mammadyarov said yesterday that officials are investigating the incident and are now seeking access to the results of the vote. It was unclear where any mistake or vote manipulation might have occurred.

Azerbaijan’s ambassador to Moscow, renowned Soviet-era crooner Polad Bulbuloglu, told Russian television it was “impossible” that Ms Garipova did not score any points in his country. Russia gave the Azerbaijani entry the maximum 12 points.

Mr Bulbuloglu said: “According to this data, Russia should have received ten points from Azerbaijan. An announcement will be made about this tonight on Azeri Public Television.”

Jarmo Siim, spokesman for the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which holds the competition, said the final tally for each country is a 50/50 combination of the telephone votes and the votes of a national jury. A country that received a good result in the phone vote could be left with no points overall if the jury gave its highest points to other contestants, he said.

Mr Siim said the EBU contracted the German company Digame to register the votes. He said Digame has partnerships with several telecoms operators in all countries, but they are only responsible for the technical part of registering the calls. The votes are then verified separately.

The EBU said it has no plans to start any investigation since it has no indications that anything went wrong. It promised to

reveal how the public and the jury voted in a couple of weeks, but Mr Siim said the EBU will only provide an overall European figure.

Local broadcasters may reveal more details.