A bi-partisan group of ninety-six U.S. Senate and House members have called on Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to apply their discretionary authority under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act to sanction Azerbaijani leaders responsible for the brutal blockade and attacks on Nagorno-Karabakh’s (Artsakh) 120,000 indigenous Armenian Christian population, reported the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).

POLITICO’s National Security Daily was the first to report on the letter led by Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Representatives Seth Magaziner (D-RI), Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), and Frank Pallone (D-NJ).

“We urge the Departments of State and Treasury to immediately exercise discretionary authority to impose sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (Global Magnitsky Act, Title XII, Subtitle F of P.L. 114-328; 22 U.S.C. §10101 et seq.) on individuals in the government of Azerbaijan associated with the military attacks against and brutal blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh.

“These actions represent a gross violation of human rights and the perpetration of violent conflict, which both pose a direct assault on American values and interests. The perpetrators of these human rights violations must be held to account by the United States,” the aforesaid letter reads, in part.