Azernews.Az

BAKU – Azerbaijan’s Nagorno Karabakh region has been occupied, a US lawmaker has told Congress, referring to the Armenia-occupied territory that has been invaded since a war in the early 1990s.

In his address over the anniversary of Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR), Democratic Congressman Ed Pastor also said that despite the world economic crisis, Azerbaijan has posted rampant economic growth in the past three years.

Members of the House of Representatives representing a number of US states and political parties delivered congratulatory messages to Azerbaijan over May 28, the Day of Republic, which marked 93 years since the establishment of the first-ever secular democratic republic in the Islamic world.

Representative Dan Boren, who co-chairs the House taskforce for Azerbaijan, said in his remarks that Azerbaijan is a secular and democratic state. He noted that the country is a major contributor to the US and NATO operations in Afghanistan and closely cooperates with the United States in the area of nuclear non-proliferation.

Representative Lynn Woolsey stressed that ADR granted suffrage to women two years before the U.S. did. Woolsey termed Azerbaijan as a modern state with a wide range of religious freedoms that is politically and economically stable.

Another US lawmaker, Shelley Capito, termed Azerbaijan as a graphic example of religious and ethnic tolerance, saying that Jewish and Christian communities are freely operating in the country.

Representative Edolphus Towns in turn said the U.S. and Azerbaijan have established firm relations, and Azerbaijan today has turned into a key player in global energy security. Towns noted that the country provided 25 percent of Israel’s oil imports in 2009 and is one of the key potential sources of gas for the Western-backed Nabucco pipeline.

Congressman Ed Whitfield said Azerbaijan’s unique location has turned it into a melting pot of different nations and religious traditions and enabled the country to play the role of a political and cultural bridge between the East and West.