Today.Az » Politics » U.S. State Department to check issue on NDI office in Azerbaijan
02 April 2013 [10:50] - Today.Az
The U.S. State Department will check into the issue regarding
activity of the National Democratic Institute (NDI) office in
Azerbaijan, U.S. State Department Spokesperson Victoria Nuland said at a
traditional press briefing.
"I don't have any information on that particular assertion by the
government. I don't know whether it happened in the last couple of days.
We'll check into it. But as you know, all of our U.S.-funded democracy
NGOs operate within extremely tight guidelines. They don't fund any
particular party or any particular ideological approach," she said.
Nuland said these institutes finance the process of democratic
elections and party building in an evenhanded manner across the
political spectrum.
Azerbaijani Prosecutor General Zakir Garalov has appealed to the U.S.
ambassador in the country, Richard Morningstar, in connection with the
activity of the representative office of the National Democratic
Institute (NDI) in Azerbaijan, a source in the Foreign Ministry said on
Friday.
According to the appeal, articles published in the press in
connection with deficiencies in the representative office's activity
caused a great public outcry.
As a result of the investigation conducted by prosecution bodies, it
was revealed that the Azerbaijani laws on 'Non-governmental
organisations (public associations and foundations)', 'State
Registration of Legal Entities and State Register' and 'Grants' were
violated while the NDI representative office was operating in
Azerbaijan.
Moreover the NDI violated the conditions of the 'Rules about the
form, content and order of submitting the annual financial report of
non-governmental organisations', approved by the decision of the
Azerbaijani Cabinet of Ministers dated December 25, 2009.
According to the appeal, NDI offices and regional information centres
which were not registered in an appropriate manner and not accredited
in Baku, Ganja, Tovuz, Shirvan, Yevlakh, Sheki, Khachmaz and Jalilabad
issued grants until July 23, 2012 and have not submitted annual
financial reports to the relevant executive bodies after the reporting
period was over.
It was also found out that head of the representative office Alex
Grigoriev took $1.007 million in cash from an account opened at the
International Bank of Azerbaijan, without providing information on the
purpose of its use from March 2, 2010 to December 13, 2012. /Trend/
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