Azernews.Az

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Matthew Bryza’s appointment as the US ambassador to Azerbaijan was to be discussed in the US Senate on Tuesday.

It was not immediately clear whether or not the senators would vote on the former State Department official’s nomination.

The Foreign Relations Committee approved Bryza’s appointment on September 21. His candidacy is now to be endorsed by the full Senate.

The Senate was expected to consider endorsing an ambassador to Turkey on the same day.

The post of US ambassador to Azerbaijan has been vacant since July 2009. The White House nomination has faced roadblocks in the legislature due to the efforts of several senators, who accuse him of advancing Turkey and Azerbaijan’s cause.

Bryza has a near-22-year-long diplomatic career that put him at the center of two of the South Caucasus’ most strategic issues: resolution of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict and the introduction of non-Russia-related oil and gas pipelines from Baku to the Black Sea.

As deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs from 2005 to 2009, Bryza coordinated US energy policy in the Black and Caspian Sea regions, and represented the U.S. on the OSCE’s Minsk Group talks on a resolution of Azerbaijan’s 22-year conflict with Armenia over the occupied region of Nagorno Karabakh.