DANGEROUS BORDER GAMES

Important trade routes have always been a subject of fights—both in ancient times and today. Depending on situation, these routes included caravan routes, convenient harbours, railway junctions and mountain passes.

But there were times when military conflicts have dramatically changed logistics. Like after the 44-day Second Garabagh War, when the South Caucasus found itself on the threshold of new revolution in logistics. And it is the corridor between the mainland Azerbaijan and Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic that should be a main component, or a turning point in this revolution. Unblocking of communications is one of the important topics of the post-conflict settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

The corridor geography and Pashinian's fear

This was confirmed once again during the April 6 bilateral meeting between the Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, mediated by the President of European Council Charles Michel. In his concluding statement, Mr. Michel noted that "the leaders also discussed the restoration of communications infrastructure, communication links between Armenia and Azerbaijan and more broadly in the South Caucasus.” Michel welcomed the steps taken towards the restoration of railway communication, and called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to find effective ways to restore road communication as well, pledging the assistance of the European Union.

More recently, Nikol Pashinyan made a very interesting statement on the corridor. At a governmental meeting held on March 31, he made a presentation on the current situation of talks with Azerbaijan on unblocking transport communications in the post-war region: “You all know that Armenia has submitted a set of comprehensive proposals on this issue. In essence, we offered the reconstruction of the Yeraskh-Julfa-Ordubad-Meghri-Goradiz railway, as well as the motorway to connect the eastern parts of Azerbaijan with Nakhchivan. This should take place together with the establishment of border, customs and other control posts at the border. Azerbaijan both accepts and refuses to accept our proposals. They say that they agree with any legal status of using the road provided that the same regime be introduced in the Lachin corridor.” Then Pashinyan began to explain how wrong Azerbaijan is. He noted that the Azerbaijani side refers to the November 10, 2020 trilateral statement between Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia. But Pashinyan claims that, firstly, "the statement does not mention corridors on the territory of Armenia, while the concept of the Lachin corridor is included in the document". Secondly, "parallels between Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan look strange for several reasons. First of all, because Nakhchivan has a land communication with Azerbaijan through Iran and Turkey, and an air one through Iran and Armenia. Nagorno-Karabakh has only a land communication with Armenia, and only through the Lachin corridor.” Finally, Nikol Pashinian said that the November 10 statement 'does not provide for any corridor through the Armenian territory, and we do not accept the 'corridor logic'.

But what is Nikol Pashinian really afraid of?

The corridor trap

To begin with, we can quote paragraph 9 of the November 10 statement: "All economic and transport communications in the region will be unblocked. The Republic of Armenia guarantees the security of transport links between the western regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic in order to organise the unhindered movement of citizens, vehicles and goods in both directions. Transport communication is controlled by the border service institutions of the Federal Security Service of Russia". This means that the Zangezur corridor is specified in the trilateral statement.

Meanwhile, Armenia made it very clear from the beginning that they did not want to hear about any corridor. Moreover, the situation around the Zangezur corridor and in Zangezur in general began to escalate. Former Armenian ombudsman Arman Tatoyan was especially zealous in this. Later he was dismissed from office, but we are not sure if this reduced the political tension. Finally, Armenia is well aware that the unblocking of communications should be preceded by border demarcation and delimitation. This is a priori a painful issue for Yerevan. Today Armenia has to return significant territories illegally attached to it during the occupation of Garabagh. This causes understandable tension in the Armenian society. After all, they have not respected the principle of 'no trespassing' with regard to the territories of neighbouring countries.

Iranian move and Lachin Corridor

But now, even before the Brussels summit, the situation has changed dramatically. Azerbaijan has concluded very ambitious transport and logistics agreements with Iran. This means that Baku is laying a transport corridor not along the northern Armenian side, but along the southern Iranian side of the Araz River, which is 40 or so kilometres that separate Nakhchivan from the mainland Azerbaijan. But this will be based on the principle of 'equal status' for both the Zangezur and Lachin corridors.

In practice, such agreements mean political disaster for Armenia.

They do not like to mention it in Yerevan, but Armenia was the first to use the blockade tactic in the region, depriving Nakhchivan of its communication lines with Baku. At that time, Yerevan viewed the blockade of the Zangezur section of the road and railway as a tool of pressure on Azerbaijan. Just as now, after the 44-day war.

But now the situation is changing. Azerbaijan has an alternative to the Zangezur corridor: not only the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway and the Kars-Igdir-Nakhchivan line under construction, but also the Iranian corridor. If Armenia refuses to open the corridor, it will lose the chance to unblock communications and the Yeraskh (Arazdeyen)-Nakhchivan-Julfa road mentioned by Pashinyan. Unblocking communications cannot be done unilaterally.

Yerevan’s ‘game of barriers’ also hurts Moscow's interests. Until recently, it was Russia that moderated the negotiations to unblock the communications. In addition, Russia has its own interest: it owns Armenia's railways and has no chance of making them profitable without unblocking the communications. Neither does it have a chance of getting railway communication between Russia and Armenia, the only country in the South Caucasus that is a member of the EAEU and CSTO. And all due to Yerevan’s fault.

Baku has managed to push through the principle of corridors with equal status. If Armenia continues to refuse to unblock the Zangezur corridor, Azerbaijan has every reason to close the Lachin corridor.

Yerevan is well aware that this would be a real disaster for Armenia, inevitably triggering a new wave of escape from the part of Garabagh currently controlled by Russian peacekeepers. Moreover, the corridor does not necessarily need to be closed for this purpose—it is enough to indicate the possibility of changing its regime.

How will Yerevan’s ruling elite handle the ‘corridor shock’ now?