•HRES 537 IH 
sponsible for his kidnapping are unidentified and face no 
consequences; 
Whereas the 2017 Annual Report of the United States Com-
mission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) 
found that in 2016 the Government of Azerbaijan ‘‘in-
creased its repression of independent religious activity, 
closing Sunni mosques, raiding religious bookshops, and 
harassing Jehovah’s Witnesses and certain Protestant 
communities’’; 
Whereas, as of September 1, 2017, more than 90 prisoners 
of conscience are in jail for exercising their constitu-
tionally guaranteed freedoms of religion and assembly; 
Whereas the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability 
Act authorizes the United States Government to deny 
travel visas and freeze the United States-based assets of 
foreign government officials responsible for ‘‘extrajudicial 
killings, torture, or other gross violations of internation-
ally recognized human rights’’ or ‘‘ordering, controlling, 
or otherwise directing, acts of significant corruption’’; 
and 
Whereas the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 
authorizes the United States Government to deny travel 
visas to any foreign government official responsible for 
‘‘particularly severe violations of religious freedom’’, in-
cluding ‘‘torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treat-
ment or punishment; prolonged detention without 
charges; causing the disappearance of persons by the ab-
duction or clandestine detention of those persons; or 
other flagrant denial of the right to life, liberty, or the 
security of persons’’: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 
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•HRES 537 IH 
(1) affirms the importance of the United States 
partnership with the Government of Azerbaijan in 
the strategic areas of international security, Euro-
pean energy security, and economic development; 
(2) calls on the United States Government, in 
its diplomatic engagement and delivery of bilateral 
assistance, to prioritize as a matter of strategic im-
portance its response to the Government of Azer-
baijan’s violations of universally recognized human 
rights, fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law to 
ensure the long-term sustainability of the United 
States-Azerbaijani bilateral partnership; 
(3) calls on the Government of Azerbaijan to 
immediately release all political prisoners and pris-
oners of conscience, rehabilitate their records, lift 
travel bans, and cease harassment, intimidation, and 
mistreatment of citizens engaged in political speech, 
independent journalism, and other forms of advocacy 
on behalf of government accountability, democratic 
values, and universally recognized human rights; 
(4) urges the United States Government to 
closely evaluate reporting from intelligence, diplo-
matic, open source, congressional, and nongovern-
mental organization sources to identify and impose 
travel and financial restrictions on Government of 
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•HRES 537 IH 
Azerbaijan officials responsible for gross violations 
of internationally recognized human rights, pursuant 
to the provisions of the Global Magnitsky Human 
Rights Accountability Act; 
(5) urges the United States Government to 
closely evaluate reporting from intelligence, diplo-
matic, open source, congressional, and nongovern-
mental organization sources to identify and impose 
travel restrictions on Government of Azerbaijan offi-
cials responsible for severe violations of religious 
freedom, pursuant to the provisions of the Inter-
national Religious Freedom Act of 1998; and 
(6) stands with the people of Azerbaijan in sup-
port of their peaceful efforts to achieve democratic 
reform and exercise their fundamental freedoms en-
shrined in the Helsinki Final Act and other inter-
national charters. 
Æ 
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