More than $150 billion in oil and gas revenues over the past 10 years created unprecedented opportunities for Azerbaijan to invest into lobbying to hush critical voices from inside the country and abroad and to improve its relations with the west.
The Sunlight Foundation previously placed Azerbaijan in the top 10 countries spending fortunes on lobbying companies in Washington, DC. According to the Foundation, the country spent about $2.3 million on lobbying in 2013. During the years of peak oil revenues (2010-2015) spending on lobbying remained very high.
In 2015 investigative journalists discovered that the Azerbaijani Embassy pays hundreds of thousands of dollars to its main lobbying organizations, the Podesta Group.
Further details and source: Crude Accountability