Azerbaijan, Baku, 8 April / corr. Trend I. Khalilova/ The U.S. Agency for International Development has appealed to the U.S. government to increase financial support for Azerbaijan for 2009-2010 and to keep it, at least, on the level of the 2008 budget, said Scott Tailor, the USAID coordinator for Azerbaijan. $16mln has been allocated to realize projects for social and economic developments in 2008 whereas the allocation was $23mln in 2007.
"The financial support of USAID to Azerbaijan is being reduced every year, but it will not affect Azerbaijan-U.S. relations," said Tailor.
According to Tailor, the Inter-Government Commission on Economic Cooperation is discussing the possibilities of financing to development the social and economic spheres in line with market conditions and democracy. He attributes the reduction of financial support to military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and the increasing revenue from oil and Azerbaijan's increasing wealth.
The Azerbaijani government has proposed joint financing of projects to expand cooperation, said USAID coordinator. According to the coordinator, the volume of U.S. financial support in joint projects will depend on the processes in social and economic spheres and the results of elections.
The correspondent can be contacted at: [email protected]