The Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly) called on the Department of Justice to investigate potentially illegal activities of U.S. groups with ties to foreign entities in Turkey and Azerbaijan.

The Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) and the House Committee on Ethics concluded that 9 members of Congress and more than two dozen staff members accepted a trip that was improperly paid for by foreign corporations in Azerbaijan and Turkey, Assembly said in a statement.

In addition to attending a convention in Azerbaijan, several Members of Congress and their staff also traveled to Turkey free of cost. The OCE's review found that the congressional travel to Azerbaijan and Turkey was “not funded exclusively by the entities disclosed on travel forms submitted to the Committee on Ethics.”

Earlier the investigation conducted by USA TODAY revealed that Gulen groups, Turkish organizations who follow the leadership of Fethullah Gulen, "secretly funded as many as 200 trips to Turkey for members of Congress and staff since 2008, repeatedly violating House rules and possibly federal law."

“The revelations by the USA TODAY investigation, in addition to the Office of Congressional Ethics investigation, are remarkable,” the Assembly said in its letter to Attorney General Loretta Lynch. “We respectfully request a full and thorough investigation by the Department of Justice into these groups and the full application of the law. The reported activities constitute plainly illegal behavior and strikes at the core of our Constitutional government through blatant foreign influence peddling.”