The US House of Representatives and Senate on December 9 approved a proposal to provide $41 million to Armenia and $8 million to the ethnic Armenian-dominated breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, Armenian news sources reported.

The Asbarez Post newspaper said that the final number is a reconciled version of the House's more generous offer of almost $60 million and the Senate's proposed $30 million package, which did not include aid for Karabakh and was a 39-percent decrease from 2008. Aram Hamparian, director of the Armenian National Committee of America, a Diaspora group, said that the aid package to Armenia is down to "nearly half of what was appropriated two years ago," Asbarez reported on December 11.