The Republic of Azerbaijan is taking CNN to court over the network’s reporting on the Iran war, accusing the news organization of falsely linking the country to Israeli military operations against its neighbor.
Azerbaijan filed a defamation lawsuit against CNN in Delaware federal court on Tuesday over a June 5 report that said Israel sent military and intelligence personnel into Azerbaijan to conduct operations against Iran.
A CNN spokesperson told TheWrap on Wednesday, “We stand by our reporting.”
The CNN report, which cited people familiar with the operation, said Israeli personnel used Azerbaijan for reconnaissance and attacks during the conflict with Iran. It also linked the operation to a March attack that killed the intelligence chief of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The case puts CNN in the unusual position of facing a defamation claim brought by a foreign government, raising the question of whether a foreign sovereignty can sue an American news organization for libel in the first place.
Government bodies in the United States generally cannot sue their critics for defamation. Azerbaijan argues that the First Amendment rationale behind that protection does not extend to foreign governments, which are not accountable to American voters.
Azerbaijan has denied allowing its territory to be used for attacks on Iran. In its complaint, the country argues that CNN’s reporting jeopardized its neutrality in the conflict and risked inflaming its relationship with its neighbor. The country has also taken aim at CNN’s handling of the dispute, alleging that the network was aware of what Azerbaijan characterized as previous biased reporting by one of the journalists behind the story.
According to the lawsuit, attorneys for Azerbaijan (represented by Cole Schotz and Brown Rudnick) demanded a retraction and correction from CNN in June and followed up in July. CNN subsequently declined to retract the report.
Azerbaijan further argues that CNN’s reporting involved factual claims about whether the country secretly facilitated military activity — rather than criticism or opinion — and says those assertions can be tested in court.
