Congress must repeal 1992 law hindering growth in the South Caucasus

American drivers are paying more at the pump because Iran has turned the Strait of Hormuz into a war zone, and the safest overland alternative runs straight through a country Congress has punished by an obsolete law for 34 years.

The 1992 Freedom Support Act bars direct U.S. government assistance to Baku, a distinction no other former Soviet state carries. It was written, however, for a war that ended more than 30 years ago, in a 1994 ceasefire. The U.S. plays a whole different ballgame in the South Caucasus, a vital nexus between Europe and Central Asia, and between Russia and the Middle East, that combines energy and geostrategy.

The timing isn’t just about tidying up outdated law; this comes at a time when Iran and the U.S. are at war. China has been carefully tightening its grip on Central Asia, and Armenia and Azerbaijan, after decades of hostility, are closer to a real peace than they have been since the Soviet collapse. It is now up to Congress to back that talk of partnership with actual legislative action.

President Trump hosted Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Aug. 8, 2025. There, the two leaders initialed a peace framework and signed a joint declaration establishing the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity or TRIPP, a 27-mile corridor through Armenia’s Syunik province linking Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave. It was, by any measure, a genuine diplomatic breakthrough after 37 years of hostility.

Pashinyan has........

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