As a result of Section 907, Azerbaijan is the only nation to which the United States denies direct humanitarian aid (aid funneled through NGOs is not considered direct aid). Even Cuba, Libya, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq—all avowed adversaries of the United States—are allowed to obtain direct American humanitarian assistance. Since 1993, the United States has given over $1 billion to Armenia in aid, but only a fraction of that to Azerbaijan, and then, only through the NGOs.
In the United States, there have been many calls for the repeal of Section 907. This past summer, there was a vote in the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee approving the “Silk Road Strategy Act,” a bill that would extend to the eight countries of the Caucasus and Central Asia equally the same American economic, political, and security benefits enjoyed by Russia, Ukraine and Central Europe. The legislation, in effect, would lift the six-year-old ban on direct aid to Azerbaijan. However, action on this bill has been delayed until the next Congress. There was also a move to repeal Section 907 in the House of Representatives. It passed the Committee on Appropriations but was defeated on the floor of the full House by a massive effort of the Armenian lobby.
The Armenians, of course, are pushing to keep Section 907. Armenia’s Ambassador to the United States, Rouben Shugarian, said that lifting the aid ban without getting anything in return from Azerbaijan would harden that country’s position in the peace negotiations on Nagorno-Karabakh.
Among many American foreign policy experts, the passing of the Silk Road bill in the Senate Foreign Relations committee is a realization that the oil resources of Azerbaijan and the Caspian basin will likely be more important than the narrowly focussed efforts of the Armenian lobby. The legislation is important to American corporations at a time when they are facing vigorous competition in the region from Russia, Western Europe, Japan, and the Middle East. Foreign companies have raised the legislative restrictions of Section 907 as a reason why the Azeri government should award oil contracts to them rather than to American companies. The existence of the Silk Road legislation, however, provides a tangible demonstration of America’s desire to play a more constructive role in Azerbaijan.