The Observer has quite a long history with Spanish Inquisitors for setters.

It starts with Edward Powys Mathers in 1926 who used the pseudonym Torquemada after the First Grand Inquisitor.
Derrick Somerset Macnutt took over in 1939 as Ximines after Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros
Jonathan Crowther replaced him in 1972 as Azed, name chosen as you explained.

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Sounds quite impressive to me, weerover. I still haven’t tried AZED and would need the grid and letters from solved clues even for simple crosswords.