Armenia reassures Iran's Pezeshkian it will control Trump 'peace corridor'

Tehran fears US forces being stationed in region under deal with Azerbaijan

Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, left, welcomed Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in the capital Yerevan. EPA

Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian met the leader of Armenia on Tuesday on a visit to the Caucasus region, which Tehran fears will soon become a beacon of US influence.

Mr Pezeshkian was holding talks with Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on his second day in the country, to discuss trade, investment and a US-proposed peace corridor.

Mr Pezeshkian said the region "should not become an arena for geopolitical competition". He won an assurance from Mr Pashinyan that "roads passing through Armenia will be under the exclusive jurisdiction of Armenia, and security will be provided by Armenia, not by any third country"

Leaders from Armenia and Azerbaijan shook hands on a peace deal this month at talks hosted by US President Donald Trump, aimed at ending decades of conflict between the two countries. An agreement was also reached on a so-called Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (Tripp), connecting Azerbaijan to its Nakhchivan exclave and passing near the Iranian border.

Details of the Trump corridor have not been finalised but it is expected that a consortium of private US companies will be given exclusive development rights for a railway route and fibre optic, oil and gas lines on a 99-year lease.

For Armenia and Azerbaijan, the agreement is the first significant step towards ending more than 30 years of animosity. The two sides have met several times in the past year, including last month in Abu Dhabi, to discuss the continuing peace process.

But Iran has long opposed the planned transit route, also known as the Zangezur corridor, fearing it will cut the country off from Armenia and the rest of the Caucasus while bringing potentially hostile foreign forces close to its borders. Iran threatened to block the corridor on the same day the agreement was signed, Iranian media reported. Iran's President has also made his concerns public.

“The (possible) presence of American companies in the region is worrying,” Mr Pezeshkian said before his departure. He said he would discuss his concerns with Armenian officials. On Sunday, the Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Armenia had given Iran assurances that no US forces or security companies will be in Armenia under cover of the corridor.

The Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict dates back to the 1980s. Local authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnically Armenian-majority area of territory internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, declared their intention to break away and align with Armenia.

As the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s, Nagorno-Karabakh declared independence, and fighting between Armenians and Azerbaijan led Armenia to take about 20 per cent of Azerbaijani territory.

Azerbaijan reclaimed significant territory in the second conflict in 2020. Three years later, it carried out a lightning offensive that led to the dissolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh breakaway state and the displacement of its tens of thousands of Armenian residents.