Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian confirmed last week that Washington has suggested that a U.S. company run a transport corridor to Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave passing through Armenia’s strategic Syunik region. Pashinian signaled readiness to accept the proposal, saying that Baku and Yerevan are now “intensively” discussing it. He also seemed open to the idea of a 100-year U.S. lease on the Armenian section of the corridor also floated by Washington.
A short readout released by the Armenian government suggests that the issue was on the agenda of Grigorian’s meeting with Kvien. It said they discussed “regional developments” and “possibilities of unblocking communication routes in the region.” They also touched upon U.S.-Armenian economic ties, added the statement. The U.S. Embassy in Yerevan did not immediately issue a statement on the meeting.
Armenian opposition leaders and other critics of Pashinian have expressed serious concern over the U.S. proposal. They say that such an arrangement would undermine Armenian sovereignty over Syunik, the only Armenian province bordering Iran.
Tehran is strongly opposed to the so-called “Zangezur corridor” sought by Baku as well as the presence of “extra-regional” forces in the South Caucasus. Grigorian met with the Iranian ambassador to Armenia, Mehdi Sobhani, two days after Pashinian’s remarks made at a news conference. Pashinian spoke with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian by phone the next day.
Meanwhile, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who held talks with Pashinian in Abu Dhabi on July 10, insisted that the transit of people and cargo through Syunik must be exempt from Armenian border controls. Pashinian’s spokeswoman, Nazeli Baghdasarian, rejected the demand on Monday, saying that it amounts to a “hidden territorial claim against Armenia.”
Armenian opposition figures downplayed Baghdasarian’s reaction. They stood by their claims that Pashinian has agreed to open an extraterritorial land corridor for Azerbaijan.