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At a meeting of the Board of Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), which took place on 15 October in the capital of Myanmar a decision was taken in regard of Azerbaijan. The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) decided at a board meeting to require Azerbaijan to undergo a compliance check, reads the article on the official site of the Human Rights Watch.
As noted in the article the Azerbaijani government needs to make the necessary reforms to live up to its commitments to the transparency group or face the consequences.

"The situation facing civil society in Azerbaijan is clearly problematic. The Board discussed the findings of the fact finding mission and expressed deep concern. The Board hopes that Azerbaijan will open up more space for civil society to make its essential contribution to the EITI as laid down in our Standard. I very much hope that progress can be made,” Clare Short, Chair of the EITI Board. Source: EITI Secretariat stated.

As noted in the article, Azerbaijan is a member of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) - a prominent international coalition that promotes transparency in the management of natural resources. EITI brings together countries, companies and non-governmental groups, in order to collect and publish data on government revenues from oil, gas and mining industries. Rules for the candidates and the Member States explicitly require respect for fundamental freedoms. Active participation of civil society is a basic principle of EITI.

“Azerbaijan boasts of its membership in this international good government coalition, which is telling Azerbaijan it needs to clean up its act,” said Lisa Misol, senior business and human rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Azerbaijani government needs to make the necessary reforms to live up to its commitments to the transparency group or face the consequences.”

The Azerbaijani government has refused to register the grants of independent groups for work on natural resource transparency or related issues and frozen the bank accounts of the majority of the independent groups in the national EITI coalition of nongovernmental organizations. Authorities have also opened politically motivated investigations for alleged tax or other violations and employed other intimidation tactics against leading EITI activists.

As the HRW reports, the EITI announcement did not elaborate specific conditions Azerbaijan must meet, but an EITI blog page noted that the board reached agreement on “important identified actions related to the space for civil society.”
“With this decision, EITI’s leadership has offered some hope to independent activists in Azerbaijan who have been unable to work because of the government crackdown,” Misol said. “For the past year the government of oil-rich Azerbaijan has been impeding the activities of independent groups in the country, flouting its commitments as an EITI member. The international coalition relies on the participation of governments, companies, and independent organizations at all levels, and free and active civil society participation is one of its cornerstones.”