“The Republic of Armenia expresses its willingness to create and restore railway communication between Azerbaijan and Armenia, notably through the previously existing railways,” Pashinian told the annual UN-sponsored Ministerial Meeting of the Landlocked Developing Countries held in Yerevan.
“The first is the northern route which connects the Gazakh district of Azerbaijan with the Tavush region of Armenia, and the second is the southern route which, among others, also connects the western regions of Azerbaijan with the Autonomous Republic of Nakhichevan,” he said.
He said Armenia is also ready to provide three highways for passenger and cargo traffic between the exclave and the rest of Azerbaijan.
“In addition, we show the same readiness in terms of opening the Armenia-Turkey railway, reconstructing and reopening the two previously existing Armenia-Turkey roads,” Pashinian added during the conference attended by a senior Turkish Foreign Ministry official but shunned by Baku.
The Armenian leader went on to reiterate his government’s position that all regional transit routes “must operate under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of the countries through which they pass.” This means that people and goods passing through them cannot be exempt from border controls, he said, clearly alluding to Azerbaijani demands for an extraterritorial corridor to Nakhichevan.
The so-called “Zangezur corridor” would pass through Syunik, Armenia’s only province bordering Iran. Tehran strongly opposes it, having repeatedly warned against attempts to strip the Islamic Republic of the common border and transport links with Armenia.
A senior aide to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said in October that the corridor “has lost its attractiveness for us” and that Baku is now planning to “do this with Iran instead.” Earlier in October, Azerbaijani and Iranian officials broke ground on a new road that will connect Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan through Iran.
The European Union’s top official, Charles Michel, noted earlier this week that Baku and Yerevan continue to disagree on practical modalities of mutual transport links that would be part of a broader Armenian-Azerbaijani peace deal.
“President Aliyev made it very clear many times that he doesn't have any territorial claim [to Armenia,]” Michel told RFE/RL. “But there is a debate on the concrete modalities to make sure that those modalities will respect the sovereignty and the jurisdiction of Armenia.”
Armen Khachatrian, a senior lawmaker from Pashinian’s Civil Contract party, praised Michel’s remarks on Thursday. He suggested that Baku has not given up on the “Zangezur corridor.”
“Baku has pursued that goal for many years, long before the 2020 war,” Khachatrian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “It’s just that their desire sometimes becomes more acute and is sometimes suppressed until a more opportune moment. Right now they are not talking about that and are even saying that if Armenia doesn’t want to open that road it will pass through Iran.”