Zangezur corridor

Main article: Armenia

2023

Plan to build a railway from Turkey to Nakhichevan

During the trip of Turkish President Erdogan to Nakhichevan in September 2023, several agreements were signed, and a roadmap for the development of the region was demonstrated as part of the implementation of the Trans-Caspian multimodal corridor project.

Over the next five years, with the joint efforts of Turkey and Azerbaijan, it is planned to lay a railway bed 224 km long, build 5 stations, 10 bridges, 465 culverts and 144 underground passages on the Kars - Nakhichevan route.

In addition to the obvious advantages for Azerbaijan, this gives impetus to the Turkish regions due to the emergence of the railway, and also further links Nakhichevan to the Turkish economy.

The installation of an electric railway line is necessary for the efficient functioning of the corridor from Central Asia. But the transit through the Syunik region of Armenia and the presence of the Russian Armed Forces create obstacles with which the Rybar channel wrote in the West, that in Turkey they want to deal with Azerbaijan as quickly as possible.

Western countries seek to oust Russia from the region

On May 18, 2023, ambassadors of 15 European countries with the head of the EU delegation to Armenia Andrea Victorin visited Kapan and Goris on Europe Day.

The southern administrative unit of Armenia is of great importance for the collective West. In addition to the fact that there is a contingent of the RF Armed Forces in Kapan, Meghri and Sisian, an Iranian consulate is also located in Kapan.

For May 2023

But even more importantly, it is in the south of the Syunik region that the project of the Zangezur corridor is taking place, in which they are especially interested in the West due to the promising economic and geopolitical prospects for its implementation.

2022: Clash of interests of many countries

In Zangezur, the interests of several parties collide. They can be divided into three groups: local (Armenia and Azerbaijan), regional (Turkey and) Iran and global (Israel and). Russia

Local

The importance of the corridor for Azerbaijan, first of all, lies in the creation of a direct road with the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic and the liberation of the region from the blockade.

This path will provide ground communication between Azerbaijan and Turkey. This fact will allow to remove the dependence of Azerbaijanis on transit through Iranian territory.

Connecting to the enclave and laying a trade route will make a significant contribution to economic growth in the southern regions, create prerequisites for investment in infrastructure and increase the life of the population.

For Armenia, the opening of this path will also allow to lift the ground blockade and in the future create a railway route with Iran and Russia. This will have a positive effect on the economy of not only the Syunik region, but also the whole of Armenia.

However, despite its advantages, in the form of profits for transit, representatives of the political authorities in Yerevan fear the possible consequences of the project.

Armenia believes that the opening of the corridor will be a violation of the country's sovereignty. According to a trilateral statement dated November 10, 2020, control over customs posts will be exercised by the FSB of Russia. And the Armenians will not have control.

Therefore, geopolitical risks for Armenia are many times higher than economic benefits. Because of this, in 2022, the administration of Armenian President Pashinyan in Yerevan is actively delaying the opening of the transport hub.

Regional

For Turkey, the Zangezur corridor promises great benefits. In addition to direct communication with Azerbaijan and weakening Iranian influence on transit, the corridor will create a faster path to Central Asian markets.

And direct access to Central Asia is essentially a geopolitical bridge for the spread of pan-Turkism to the Central African countries and their de facto integration.

With the implementation of this project, the Turkish dream of creating a transit hub between Europe and Asia will become a reality, which will significantly increase the country's status on the world stage.

For Iran, the corridor will have two consequences. On the one hand, the influence on Azerbaijan and Turkey in transit through Iran will weaken.

Tehran fears that the unidentified legal status of the path will allow it to be used for military purposes - for the invisible transfer of people and equipment and destabilizing the situation in the northwestern part of Iran.

At the same time, Iran in theory will be able to join the North-South transport corridor and gain access to Russia and the Black Sea bypassing Azerbaijan.

Global

For Russia, in the conditions of the imposed sanctions after the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine in 2022, the Zangezur corridor is an alternative route to the Caucasus and Turkey, and in transit through Iran - to the Middle East and Africa.

Russia will thus increase influence in the Transcaucasian region and weaken the position of hostile Georgia in the field of transit through its territory. A ground route with Armenia will also be provided.

According to the 2020 agreement, the Russian side will exercise control over the transit hub. In this situation, Russia will be able to monitor cargo flows along one of the most promising routes in the Transcaucasus in the future and secure its borders from the possible spread of pan-Turkism and extremist ideology in the Caucasus.

Another beneficiary of the opening of the corridor is Israel. In recent years, military cooperation has been developing more and more intensively between Azerbaijan and Israel.

The influence on the Zangezur corridor will make it possible to seriously hit Iranian interests, as this actually levels Iran's monopoly on transit services in the South Caucasus.

And the financing by the Israeli authorities of various projects on the territory of Azerbaijan allows secretly to place the infrastructure necessary for intelligence near the Iranian borders, as well as to consolidate its presence in the country.

Azerbaijan has a large ethnic diaspora of Jews - adherents of the Chabad ideology (ultra-Orthodox Judeo-Nazi course of Judaism), who have significant influence in Azerbaijan.

In the implementation of the project, the interests of many states collide, which creates the prerequisites for artificial escalation of the situation to ensure more favorable conditions for themselves.

On the one hand, a coalition of Turks and Azerbaijanis united by one goal, on the other, Russia, Iran and Armenia, pursuing absolutely opposite tasks, as well as Israel acting only in its own interests.

Given the intransigence in the views of some countries of the region, in the short term, changes in this direction are not expected and there are no prospects for resolving the conflict, the authors of the Rybar telegram channel noted.

The further situation will develop depending on many factors, including the growing economic crisis and its consequences, as well as the development of events in Ukraine.

2020: Britain's Anglo Asian Mining aims to get corridor from Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan

In 2007, Anglo Asian Mining received exploration and production rights at the Gedabek contract square in Nagorno-Karabakh (more than 300 sq. Km) for a period of 25 years. Gold, copper and silver mining began in 2008.

Getabak is the main region of activity of the British company in Azerbaijan. Gold, copper and silver mined in the neighboring contract territory of Gosh (300 sq km) are also processed at the Getabak complex. Gosha has been working since 2014. Geological exploration continues at the Ordubad contract site (462 sq. Km) located in the Nakhichevan Autonomous Region of Azerbaijan.

Representatives of the British company initially interpreted the content of the Statement on the end of the Artsakh War of November 9, 2020, in their favor. In their understanding, thanks to this agreement, a corridor from Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan will operate through the Syunik region of Armenia, which will greatly facilitate the implementation of the Anglo Asian Mining project for the extraction of resources in Ordubad. Thus, the Zangezur Corridor project, so desirable for the Turkish-Azerbaijani tandem, has not only political, military and logistical components, but is also one of the key ones for providing Britain resources.