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Armenia assures Iran of non-deployment of foreign forces along border: FM spox
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said Yerevan had explicitly informed Tehran that no foreign forces would be stationed along the two countries’ common border under a US-brokered peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan earlier this month.
In an interview with a radio channel on Sunday, Ismaeil Baqaei said Armenian officials have said that the construction of the corridor will be carried out with the participation of Armenian companies and an American company under Armenian law.
"We are highly sensitive about this issue, and Armenia itself is also aware of the consequences of the presence of foreign forces," he said.
Baqaei said Iran believes that foreign intervention and the presence of transregional forces in the Caucasus region is not beneficial to the regional countries and only makes the situation more complex.
He noted that the South Caucasus region is of great importance for Iran and the countries in the region, especially Russia, from various political, economic, and geopolitical perspectives.
Iran’s government’s spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani also on Saturday warned that involvement of transregional actors into the Caucasus equations could have long-term negative consequences for peace and stability of the region.
Back on August 8, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed the US-mediated peace deal at the White House. The accord includes the creation of a transit corridor through Armenia to connect Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhchivan – a longstanding demand of Baku.
Under the deal, the United States will have development rights to the corridor – dubbed the "Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity" (TRIPP) – in the strategic, resource-rich region.
Iran has long opposed the modification of the corridor – often referred to as Zangezur – fearing it would cut the Islamic Republic off from the Caucasus.
Christian-majority Armenia and Muslim-majority Azerbaijan have feuded for decades over their border and the status of ethnic enclaves within each other's territories. The nations went to war twice over the disputed Karabakh region, which Azerbaijan recaptured from Armenian forces in a lightning 2023 offensive, sparking the exodus of more than 100,000 ethnic Armenians.