A bipartisan bill extending from one to five years the duration of the lifting of the arms sales embargo on the Republic of Cyprus was introduced by Democratic Senator Cory Booker and his Republican colleague Jerry Moran in the Senate International Relations Committee.

The initiative aims to ensure greater stability in military cooperation between the United States and Cyprus without requiring annual renewal of the relevant exemption from the embargo.

A vote in the Georgia International Relations Committee is scheduled for Wednesday, October 22. Although final approval by the full Senate is required, a favorable vote in the committee is expected to provide a significant boost to the legislative path of the legislation.

The House Connection

This development is directly linked to work in the House of Representatives, where expatriate Representative Chris Pappas has included a similar provision in the State Department Reauthorization Act, the annual bill that sets U.S. diplomatic policies and priorities.

However, there is no corresponding version of the bill in the Senate. This means that for the embargo lifting to proceed in practice, the bill would either have to follow a stand-alone path and be passed by the full House and Senate as a stand-alone bill or be incorporated as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which sets the annual defense budget for the United States.

If the Booker-Moran bill ultimately gets the green light from the Senate International Relations Committee on Wednesday, coupled with the fact that the proposal has already been approved by the House Foreign Relations Committee through the State Reauthorization Act, then the chances of it being included in the final NDAA text will be greatly enhanced.

What the Booker-Moran Bill Provides

The bill filed in the Senate amends two key pieces of legislation that include references to the need to renew the lifting of the Cyprus embargo.

Specifically, it amends Section 205 of the Eastern Mediterranean Security and Energy Partnership Act of 2019 (EastMed Act) and Section 1250A of the Defense Appropriations Act (NDAA) of 2020.

In both cases, the bill replaces “one fiscal year” with “five fiscal years”. With this change, the embargo lifting would not require annual reauthorization by the State Department, but would be in effect for five years before a review is required.