YEREVAN — The Armenian Foreign Ministry did not deny on Thursday a report that the United States wants an American company to oversee the movement of people and cargo from Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through Armenian territory.
Citing two unnamed diplomats, an article published earlier this week on the website of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a U.S. think tank, stated that the proposal, made by the administration of President Donald Trump, is “grounded in American strategic logic: U.S. business participation as a stabilizing force, akin to a recent deal on rare metals in Ukraine.” The article did not provide further details about the proposed logistical arrangement.
The article’s author, South Caucasus analyst Olesya Vartanyan, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Wednesday that Josh Huck, a U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state, presented the proposal to Armenia and Azerbaijan during a visit to the South Caucasus in late May.
Commenting on the article, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Ani Badalian stated that Yerevan continues to advocate for its Crossroads of Peace project, which calls for full Armenian control over a road and railway connecting Nakhichevan to the rest of Azerbaijan via Armenia’s Syunik province.
“Moreover, Armenia has proposed a number of solutions in line with that initiative, which may be acceptable to all parties involved. At the same time, various international partners also periodically present their ideas on the normalization of Armenia-Azerbaijan relations, including the unblocking of transport infrastructure between the two countries,” she said.
Discussions with “all interested partners” are ongoing, Badalian added, without elaborating.
A senior Armenian official also reiterated that Yerevan’s position on transport links with Azerbaijan remains unchanged.
