Is an Armenia-Azerbaijan Peace Agreement Really Close?

Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev are due to meet in the White House in Washington on Friday, reportedly to sign a memorandum of understanding toward concluding a peace agreement. However, President Donald Trump’s wish to be seen as helping bring about what he recently called a diplomatic “miracle” between the two countries with US mediation could be harder to realize than some seem to expect.

External commentators and foreign officials have recently been fueling a media narrative that Aliyev and Pashinyan could soon sign a peace agreement ending decades of confrontation between the neighboring South Caucasus countries. Yet key conditions both sides have put to signing it are serious remaining obstacles.

Armenia and Azerbaijan said they had settled on the draft text in May. However, Azerbaijani officials have been increasingly speaking in terms of only initialing the draft soon. This additional procedural step is hardly necessary from a formal point of view, but politically it may somewhat reduce the risk of escalation while all three governments in Baku, Yerevan, and Washington remain unchanged.

Points of disagreement that could have been part of the draft text for an agreement were left out of it so that both sides could declare progress in the talks as soon as possible. But, instead, they became conditions for signing it.

Armenia and Azerbaijan want each other to eliminate from their respective constitutions provisions that may be interpreted as territorial claims. Baku also wants the two governments to send a joint letter to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) asking it to dismantle the Minsk Group, which was created in 1992 to facilitate the peaceful resolution of the conflict between them.

It should be relatively easy for Armenia and Azerbaijan to come to an agreement on these two issues. For example, Yerevan has suggested signing the joint letter at the same time as the peace agreement.

The issue of the “Zangezur corridor”, however, is far more difficult to overcome. This concerns Azerbaijan’s demand for the freedom of movement for people and goods by land to its Nakhchivan exclave, through Armenia’s Syunik province. The issue not only involves disagreements between Baku and Yerevan but also strong opposition to some of the possible solutions from Iran and Russia.

Azerbaijan has expressed concern about the question of passport controls as it does not want its citizens to be dealt with by Armenian officials in what is in principle domestic travel. With the decades of war a very recent memory, such situations could spark frequent clashes, with risk of spillover into broader confrontation.

Pashinyan has said that electronic control systems could eliminate the need for personal passport checks. However, Baku’s objection to controls may stem from deeper concerns, such as data collection by Armenia about Azerbaijan’s citizens and others travelling to and from Nakhchivan.

Armenia is also reportedly considering outsourcing to an American firm the operation of traffic and border controls in the corridor, but it is not clear yet if this solution would be acceptable to Azerbaijan.

Iran vehemently opposes any solution that would effectively deprive it of its border with Armenia, along which the Zangezur corridor runs, and also what in its eyes would mean practical transfer of the sovereign control over the border strip from Yerevan to an American company.

Russia also strongly opposes the prospect of having no say in the operation of the Zangezur corridor because the 2020 trilateral declaration that put an end to the hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan included a provision about Russian control over it.

It is not clear if a final deal that would allow them to sign a peace agreement will come as quickly as many commentators expect.

Given the disagreements between Armenia and Azerbaijan about the transit rules for the Zangezur corridor and the intensity of Iranian and Russian opposition to the most discussed options, it is not clear if a final deal that would allow them to sign a peace agreement will come as quickly as many commentators expect—with or without mediation efforts by the United States.

If at the White House the two presidents only sign a memorandum or letter of intent about working toward a final peace agreement, the main outcome of this in the near term could be a move toward terminating the Minsk Group at the OSCE Ministerial Council in December.

Azerbaijan and Armenia may also simultaneously call constitutional referendums in the autumn. Baku has already declared 2025 to be the Year of Constitution and Sovereignty, to mark the 30^th anniversary of its constitution. Rumors about the government preparing a package of constitutional changes have been circulating for several years.

Armenia’s government has also been mentioning changing the constitution. Although both governments, sensitive to their respective sovereignty narratives, deny the two things are linked, the connection between the peace negotiations and such talk about constitutional changes is obvious.

However, the issue of the Zangezur corridor would remain unresolved. The issue may even become the cause for military escalation, especially in case of political changes in Armenia in or around the 2026 parliamentary elections. It will therefore stay at the top of regional security agenda.

Without the signing of a peace agreement, the border between Armenia and Türkiye may also remain shut. There is no sign that the United States will prioritize this question in its dialogue with Ankara, which has too many more important dimensions.

Overall, what appears most likely to come out of the White House meeting on Friday will mean further progress toward peace, but it will not provide a quick comprehensive and ultimate solution.