Beniamin Matevosyan: Turkey is already trading the “Zangezur corridor”

(Nikol Pashinyan has allowed Armenia’s sovereignty to be trampled)

Today’s geopolitical reality around Armenia resembles an auction, where the lot is not just a road through Syunik, but the country’s very right to control its own territory. Some might say the country has turned into something like an eastern bazaar, but we will stick with the term “auction.”

Statements by Turkey’s Foreign Minister, Hakan Fidan, and recent publications in the Western press, particularly in the Financial Times, expose a cynical scheme: while official Yerevan speaks of a “Crossroads of Peace,” Ankara is already actively selling this “crossroads” to global powers as a worldwide alternative to the Strait of Hormuz. This effectively turns Syunik from sovereign Armenian territory into a bargaining chip in a larger energy and logistics game.

Hakan Fidan openly describes the launch of the so-called “Zangezur corridor” as a critical step, effectively ignoring Armenia’s position on sovereignty and jurisdiction. Moreover, the TRIPP project, backed by the United States and promoted by Turkey, clearly indicates that the fate of Armenia’s transport routes is being discussed within a quadrilateral of Ankara, Baku, Washington, and Brussels, where Armenia’s voice is reduced to a formality. Negotiations about Armenia are taking place without Armenia.

In Pashinyan’s interpretation, sovereignty has become a dangerous illusion, behind which lies de facto external control over key national interests. When the Turkish leadership presents the “Middle Corridor” (with the “Zangezur corridor” as part of it) as an “island of stability” for Europe, it becomes clear that Armenia has already been written into someone else’s scenario without its participation, and without regard for Tehran’s position.

Fidan emphasizes the “sincerity” of the parties and the proximity of a peace agreement, yet this peace appears to be a capitulation of the remnants of statehood in favor of the Turkish-Azerbaijani tandem. The use of Syunik as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz elevates the conflict to the level of global confrontation, where Armenia risks becoming a territory simply “threaded” with transit routes, stripped of real control over them.

If today, while still formally retaining leverage, Nikol Pashinyan allows Ilham Aliyev and Recep Tayyip Erdogan to trade Armenian land at diplomatic forums, a logical and troubling question arises about the future after June 7. Should Pashinyan remain in power, he will receive a mandate that Ankara may interpret as Armenia’s final refusal of resistance.

If for now Turkey is merely offering transport routes through Armenia as a commodity, after June 7 it may move to direct control over that commodity. A country whose leader legitimizes the trading of its own sovereignty for the sake of a vague “era of peace” will inevitably become a logistical appendage.

Ankara and Baku are unlikely to stop at roads: after the complete surrender Syunik to “corridor logic,” the next subject of bargaining could be demographic changes and the political restructuring of Armenia to suit Turkish transit needs. By leaving power in the hands of a leader who has allowed sovereign territory to be turned into an alternative to other countries’ sea straits, Armenia risks waking up to a reality where its borders, laws, and security are determined exclusively in offices in Ankara, while the national government’s role is reduced to servicing foreign cargo flows amid the ruins of its own statehood. Add to this that Pashinyan is changing the Constitution in response to demands from Baku, and the direction of these processes becomes clear.

Think about it…