Carnegie Endowment: U.S. may pressure Azerbaijan - perhaps by inviting President Aliyev to the White House

Published: 2025-07-03 05:32

"Azerbaijan wants to begin by opening a southern route, which it calls the 'Zangezur corridor,' through Armenia to its Nakhchivan exclave. While the 2020 Russian-brokered ceasefire envisioned some form of Russian oversight, Armenia now insists on full control over any corridor, including customs and security. Baku, however, remains skeptical and refuses to invest in a route it sees as vulnerable, for example, to political changes in Yerevan. It is therefore demanding a third-party guarantor to ensure long-term stability," notes the U.S. think tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

"The closest the sides came to compromise was under EU mediation. Brussels proposed a model based on the post-2008 Georgia–Russia precedent, in which an independent foreign operator manages the logistics of routes through the disputed regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and shares data with all parties. While the context differs, the mechanism was deemed workable. But the EU-led negotiations stalled amid renewed border clashes and the 2023 crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh that ended its existence as an ethnic Armenian enclave," the think tank emphasizes.

"Today, the only player capable of reviving talks may be the United States. The Trump administration—eager to showcase its global conflict resolution efforts—has reportedly floated a new plan like the EU model but grounded in American strategic logic: U.S. business participation as a stabilizing force, akin to a recent deal on rare metals in Ukraine. Washington appears determined to push forward. One option is to pressure Baku to drop its constitutional demands—perhaps by inviting Aliyev to the White House. But more realistically, it may lean on Yerevan to accept the U.S. model, even if doing so delays the final peace and leaves," the borders formally closed," the Carnegie Endowment adds.

By Azerbaijani-Israeli Alliance Global News