Police are conducting an operation at the office of the Russian news agency Sputnik-Azerbaijan in Baku, according to local media reports citing the press service of the Azerbaijani Ministry of Internal Affairs.

It is reported that the building has been taken under the control of law enforcement. The police have promised to release details of the searches later.

The outlet Qafqazinfo notes that the activities of Sputnik-Azerbaijan, which is part of the Russian state-run propaganda media group Rossiya Segodnya ("Russia Today"), had previously been officially suspended in Azerbaijan. However, the office continued to operate, and the agency’s staff kept coming to work, the report says.

The search at the Sputnik-Azerbaijan office is taking place against the backdrop of rising tensions between Russia and Azerbaijan, which escalated after mass detentions of members of the Azerbaijani diaspora in Yekaterinburg over murders committed in the early 2000s.