By Janet Ekstract, NEW YORK – Iran has expressed its strong opposition to a plan for a special corridor that is part of a U.S.-brokered agreement, signed by Azerbaijan and Armenia, last week. An adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Akbar Velayati told Iran’s Tasnim news agency: “With the implementation of this plot, the security of the South Caucasus will be endangered.” The agreement is expected to herald in an area of peace between the two nations with the U.S. being granted building rights to assist in construction of the corridor that will bear U.S. President Donald Trump’s name. Russia has said it would “further analyze” the corridor clause within the agreement, having noted that there are existing trilateral agreements between Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan that are still in effect. A Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said: “It should not be ignored that Armenia’s border with Iran is guarded by Russian border guards.” Despite any misgivings about the corridor, on August 9, the Kremlin welcomed the draft peace agreement, brokered by the U.S. after the deal was signed on Friday, August 8 in Washington whose aim is to end decades of conflict between the two former Soviet republics.
The agreement includes commitments to end hostilities, reopen transport routes, restart economic and trade business as well as normalize relations. The transit corridor was one of the key provisions in the agreement, proposed to run through Armenia to connect Azerbaijan and its exclave of Nakhchivan – which has been a longtime goal of Azerbaijan. Under the agreement, the U.S. would receive development rights for the route to be named “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity.” The region is strategically crucial as well as one that is rich in mineral and other resources. Meanwhile, Velayati warned that the transit corridor is an “impossible notion” and warned that it would become “a graveyard for Trump’s mercenaries.” The corridor would consist of a 20-mile stretch which experts and analysts on the region have said would give the U.S. leverage over Russia in the region. In 2020, Russia supervised an agreement to open a transit route through that region but then failed to implement it which caused consternation for Armenia. This eroded relations, especially after Russia failed to come to Armenia’s defense during a push by Azerbaijan to retake the Nagorno-Karabakh region in 2023 that Armenia had occupied for more than 20 years.
