How Could the Armenia-Azerbaijan Peace Accord Benefit Central Asia?
On August 8, Armenia and Azerbaijan signed a peace accord in Washington and committed to the construction of the Trump Route for Peace and Prosperity, a trade route that bisects Armenia, connecting the two parts of Azerbaijan.
The deal may have far-reaching repercussions on the other side of the Caspian, potentially diversifying the Trans-Caspian Middle Corridor by allowing travel from Azerbaijan, through Armenia, and onwards to Turkey.
The upbeat mood music may be premature, however. There remain numerous political hurdles to be jumped before any construction can commence, and the entry of the United States into a region where Russia, Iran, and Turkey all have interests could have unintended consequences.
“It’s certainly an opportunity, but there are risks,” said Azerbaijani political analyst and non-resident fellow at the China-Global South Project, Yunis Sharifli. “The United States can be a stabilizing force, but it could go in the opposite direction. It can also create a spoiler.”
The Problem
Armenia and Azerbaijan have maintained ice-cold relations for almost their entire existence as independent states. For over three decades, they tussled over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh, a land which lies in the internationally recognized territory of Azerbaijan, but was, upon independence, populated mainly by Armenians.
As well as costing thousands of lives and leading to hundreds of thousands of displaced persons, the enmity has also led to shuttered frontiers, which have choked trade across the South Caucasus. Armenia’s borders with both Azerbaijan and Turkey have been closed since 1993.
While Armenia has been cut off from two of its four neighbors, Azerbaijan has also been severed in two, with the exclave of Nakhchivan, which borders Turkey, separated from the rest of the country by a sliver of Armenian territory, just 20 miles wide at its narrowest point.
Conflicts in 2016, 2020, and 2023 saw Azerbaijan push Armenian troops from the region, with hundreds of thousands of Armenians fleeing Nagorno-Karabakh in fear of Azerbaijani reprisals. Since then, Baku has used its vast military superiority and geopolitical advantage to try to strongarm Armenia into accepting the construction of a corridor across its territory, threatening to use force on numerous occasions if Yerevan did not agree to its demands.
The Solution
Starting early this year, the United States began facilitating secretive negotiations between the pair, stepping into the vacuum left by Russia. The Kremlin has been sidelined from the process amid its deteriorating relations with both sides – many Armenians view Moscow as having betrayed them in the conflicts of 2020 and 2023, while Azeri-Russian relations have frayed significantly since the shooting down of Azerbaijan Airways Flight 8243 to Grozny earlier this year.
The timing of the signing ceremony, on the anniversary of the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008, was perhaps designed to reflect this shift in geopolitical alignment in the South Caucasus.
Baku and Yerevan have signed up to a project which will see the construction of the corridor run by a U.S. private company, but under the laws of the Republic of Armenia. The Financial Times reported that in the long term, it is set to include a rail link, oil and gas pipelines, and fiber-optic cables.
Pitfalls
Nevertheless, distrust and bitter enmity remain high on both sides, and there is still a long way to go before a full restoration of relations and the widespread opening of borders.
According to Benyamin Poghosian, Senior Research Fellow at the think tank, APRI Armenia, two key issues need to be overcome. The first is that both sides can interpret the peace declaration in different ways: both sides have agreed to form a corridor which should be operated under Armenian jurisdiction, but give unimpeded access to Azerbaijan.
“Azerbaijan will say, ‘in the declaration, we have unimpeded access, so I demand no passport and customs control.’ Armenia will say, in the same declaration, in the same article, it says the route should be operated under Armenian jurisdiction. So, we need territorial integrity, which means passport and customs control,’” Poghosian explained.
He notes that a similar declaration in November 2020, in which both countries committed to building a corridor that would be protected by troops from the Russian Federation Security Service (FSB), failed to come to fruition.
Baku also wants to see Yerevan change the language of its constitution to remove a reference that, in its view, enshrines a claim to Nagorno-Karabakh.
Captured military equipment from the 2020 Karabakh conflict on display in Baku, 2022; image: Joe Luc Barnes
“There are some articles in the constitution that can be changed by parliament, but the part that, in the view of Baku, makes territorial claims on Azerbaijan is in the preamble, and can only be changed via a referendum.”
Poghosian speculates that this is most likely to take place next year, potentially as part of the Armenian Parliamentary Elections in June 2026.
Consequences for Central Asia
The potential unfreezing of this route, under the auspices of the United States, could present a boon to countries beyond the Caucasus.
“It’s not only about the Nobel Prize for Trump, it’s also about the United States’ interest in creating new routes that are independent from Russia and China,” said Sharifli.
There is now a prospect that the Middle Corridor route could be simplified to involve just three countries: Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan (via the Armenian transit route), and Turkey.
This has the potential to loosen the leverage of Georgia, whose government has rapidly become Russia’s main ally in the region, while also providing an alternative route for Turkey.
Sharifli notes that while there are not necessarily any problems with the Georgian route, it runs very close to Russian troops stationed in South Ossetia, while key Georgian infrastructure projects, such as a new deep-sea port at Anaklia, will be built and operated by Chinese firms.
The Tbilisi-Poti railway in Gori, Georgia; image: Joe Luc Barnes
“The United States is engaging with Central Asian countries, particularly on critical minerals,” Sharifli told The Times of Central Asia. “They already signed an agreement with Uzbekistan on uranium, Kazakhstan will also likely see more engagement because Central Asia is an untapped market in terms of critical minerals. To import these resources, the United States also needs to secure the route.”
Others, such as Poghosian, believe that such a pitch is less based on economics than on Turkish-Azerbaijani geopolitics, and the real aim is to secure international funding and support to facilitate trade between the two countries.
Using the Trump Route as part of the trans-Caspian Middle Corridor is, he says, “mostly a geopolitical way to connect Turkey with Azerbaijan, to increase Turkish influence, and also to create problems for Iran. While many in Armenia would be happy to be part of big global transit routes, but there are serious concerns from objective experts about how much such a route would be used,” Poghosian adds, noting that the current railroad between Baku, Tbilisi, and Kars is running at “less than 20% capacity”.
Assylbek Nurgabdeshov, Assistant Professor of International Business at Edinburgh Business School, Heriot-Watt University, also puts the small scale of the planned route into perspective. “The Turkish government is building a railway from Kars to the border of Nakhchivan, but the capacity of that railway will only be 2 million tons per year. The capacity of Baku-Tiflis- Kars is now around 5 million, and they are planning to increase that to 17 million.”
Addressing Other Flaws
All this points to the fact that, despite the welcome signs from the Oval Office, the Middle Corridor has more pressing problems. The biggest bottleneck on the route remains the Caspian Sea, whose inclement weather, receding shorelines, and lack of ships can stop cargo for days on end.
“One of the main barriers is the number of vessels that are transporting those goods,” said Nurgabdeshov. This is exacerbated by the lack of a fixed schedule for crossings. He notes that while both Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan are working to grow the number of crossings, as well as improving the digital and physical infrastructure in their respective ports, the lack of reliability can end up costing businesses.
The Caspian Sea has noticeably retreated over recent years. Aktau, May 2025; image: Joe Luc Barnes
“Someone who is sitting in Amsterdam wants to know in how many days the cargo will be delivered from China to Amsterdam. And they don’t care if the ferry crossing the Caspian will be full or not. They just want to know exactly what time their goods will be there.”
Nurgabdeshov notes that in the future, competition from the Northern Corridor – a route running through Kazakhstan, Russia, and Belarus – will remain strong despite tensions between the EU and Russia, and this is partly a reflection of reliability and corporate habits. Whether the Middle Corridor can survive in a future where sanctions on Russia may one day be lifted will partly hinge on whether it can prove to be equally reliable.
“If the Middle Corridor can prove that it is a reliable, less risky route, it has a chance to continue with the same amount of goods transportation when the Russian road is opened,” he stated.
