The decision on Section 907 was one of the bonuses of the Washington meeting for Azerbaijan

Ilham Aliyev thanked Donald Trump for lifting restrictions on defense cooperation between the United States and Azerbaijan, which was regulated by the 907th amendment. Relations between Baku and Washington are becoming increasingly pragmatic, although for Trump this is only an image issue, analysts said.

As "Caucasian Knot" wrote, at a meeting in Washington on August 8, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed a declaration on the cessation of hostilities. US President Donald Trump said that the key issue that prevented the signing of a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan has been resolved, and this is the issue of the Zangezur corridor. The foreign ministers of the two countries appealed to the OSCE with a proposal to dissolve the Minsk Group. The declaration signed in Washington by Aliyev and Pashinyan could spell the end of Armenian statehood or at least lead to further loss of territory, analysts believe. The declaration recorded that territorial claims against each other will not be made, Pashinyan objected.

Exploitation of the Zangezur corridor without real security guarantees is impossible. The risks are too great, and there is reason to believe that in the absence of international control, this project could develop into a new source of tension between Azerbaijan and Armenia, said Professor Chingiz Ismayilov, Head of the Department of Economic and Social Geography at Baku State University.

"Real control is needed, possibly in the format of a UN mission, with a mandate to monitor compliance with agreements and respond to violations. After all, the key question is not even whether the Zangezur corridor will open in the near future, but whether guarantees for its safe operation will be created. As has already been said, without external responsibility, without international obligations and clear control mechanisms, this will not be an integration project, but a source of potential conflict," icma.az quoted him as saying.

He noted that for the United States, "neither the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty nor the Zangezur corridor represent "global geopolitical interest." However, in the context of image campaign, this issue is important. The current US president can present his role as a "peacemaker" who put an end to yet another regional conflict - among others, be it Cambodia and Thailand or the Middle East. For the American administration, this may be just an item on the agenda, but for us, this is a matter of national security, sovereignty and strategic future. And it is we who must make decisions based on our interests, and not on the expectations of external players. Azerbaijan has every right to demand that any project that affects its security be implemented with due international guarantees," Ismailov believes.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev thanked Donald Trump for repealing Section 907 in a statement to the press. "I would like to thank Mr. President (US Donald Trump) for lifting the restriction imposed on Azerbaijan after 33 years, just one year after it regained its independence in 1992. This happened today. The people of Azerbaijan will truly remember this day with great honor and great gratitude," Minval quoted him as saying.

"Azerbaijan has always been a supporter of pragmatic relations with the US, and now the period has come when pragmatism has triumphed in the US," analyst Farhad Mammadov Report.Az.

During Donald Trump's presidency, the US began to take more constructive steps towards the South Caucasus and Azerbaijan, agreed leading adviser to the Center for Analysis of International Relations (CAIR) Sultan Zakhidov. "Because of this misjudgment of Azerbaijan's role and policy in the Caucasus in the 1990s, especially during the Biden-Blinken administration, US influence in the region has weakened significantly. Now Donald Trump intends to correct the mistakes of the Biden administration and breathe new life into relations between Azerbaijan and the US," apa.az quoted him as saying.

US Congressman Frank Pallone said that the US repeal of Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act is wrong, since there is no basis for providing military assistance to Azerbaijan.

"Moreover, more must be done to persuade Azerbaijani President Aliyev to release the prisoners of war and political prisoners he continues to hold in Baku," he stressed, adding that the United States has a moral obligation "to ensure the safe, dignified, and sustainable return of displaced Armenians to their homeland in Nagorno-Karabakh," Frank Pallone concluded.

In 1992, the United States passed Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act, which provided economic support to the former Soviet republics. The amendment did not allow for assistance to be provided to the government of Azerbaijan. In 2001, after September 11, the Bush administration achieved a temporary waiver of the amendment due to the need for security cooperation with Azerbaijan.

However, in November 2023, after the territory of Karabakh came under the control of Azerbaijan, US Assistant Secretary of State James O'Brien announced his intention not to extend the suspension of the amendment, haqqin.az recalls