The State oil Company of Azerbaijan SOCAR made a statement on the claims spread in foreign Mass Media that it has secretly funded 2013 lawmaker trip.
The statement reads:
`At no time did SOCAR hide from the attendees of the conference our involvement - as the story notes, SOCAR`s logo and name was presented prominently in Baku at the conference. SOCAR has never been under investigation in this matter because the responsibility for disclosing SOCAR’s financial support for the conference fell to those who were the trip’s public sponsors.
We have cooperated fully with this investigation. We are therefore disappointed that the compliance procedures were not followed correctly by the trip`s sponsors and we are unclear why these disclosures were omitted. SOCAR will happily work to address this situation, and looks forward to sponsoring future events to introduce lawmakers to the issues concerning this critical region`.
Note that several foreign websites reported citing to the new report by the US Office of Congressional Ethics that`the state-owned oil company allegedly spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in secret to pay for 10 lawmakers and more than 30 staffers to travel to Baku in May 2013 as part of an effort to keep a giant natural gas project exempt from U.S. sanctions on Iran`.
Azerbaijani SOCAR refutes US claims against itself
14 May 2015
Read: 2185
