Beniamin Matevosyan: Turkey continues belling the “Zangezur Corridor” to the world

(Ankara sees itself as a new global transportation hub)

Against the backdrop of the escalating conflict around the Strait of Hormuz and the potential paralysis of the world’s vital energy arteries, Turkey is launching a large-scale geopolitical game, positioning its territory as the sole “island of stability” and a safe haven for global trade. Leading Turkish publications, notably the newspaper Yeni Şafak, following Financial Times, are once again actively promoting the concept of the so-called “Zangezur Corridor,” not merely as a regional project, but as a critically important global alternative. For Ankara, this route has become the central element of an ambitious plan to seize control over transit flows between Asia and Europe. In the Turkish media landscape, the corridor through Armenian territory is already spoken of as an accomplished fact, ignoring Yerevan’s sovereign reservations and presenting the project as part of “a path to international peace and prosperity.”

The strategic importance of this route for Ankara has sharply increased due to the threat of traditional Gulf routes being blocked. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan openly states that the current global crisis is opening “new doors” for Turkey, allowing it to transform security threats into economic opportunities. As part of this geoeconomic maneuver, Turkish authorities have already begun the technical outfitting of the “Alijan” border crossing on the border with Armenia, which has remained closed for more than thirty years. This crossing is viewed as the “missing puzzle piece” of the so-called Middle Corridor. The Turkish elite, including former Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, cites impressive figures: annual trade between Europe and Asia amounts to three trillion dollars, and diverting part of that flow to an overland route through Turkey and the South Caucasus could reduce cargo delivery times from 40 to 12–15 days.

At the heart of this vision lie two pillars: the “Development Road” project through Iraq, and the strengthening of the transport axis connecting Turkey with Azerbaijan, specifically through Armenian territory. As Yeni Şafak reports, major Turkish construction firms such as Kalyon are already laying railway tracks on both sides of the planned route. Ankara’s optimism is reinforced by interest from EU officials, who describe the Middle Corridor as a “game-changer.” However, behind the glossy presentations lie serious geopolitical obstacles. J.P. Morgan experts warn that the route remains an “elusive necessity” due to logistical challenges on the Caspian, and Russia has made it unmistakably clear that Armenia’s pivot toward the West and attempts to bypass Moscow’s interests in the region could have severe consequences for Yerevan up to and including disruptions in gas supplies.

Against this backdrop, Nikol Pashinyan’s statements appear, to say the least, detached from reality. While Turkey and Azerbaijan are effectively dictating the future of Armenian territories, planning logistics chains of global scale, Pashinyan is addressing NSS border troops with promises to complete border demarcation and hand all frontier zones over exclusively to Armenian units.

Such domestic rhetoric, accompanied by news of conscript recruitment into border forces, is perceived by many experts as an attempt to “feed the public fairy tales” about sovereignty, at a time when key decisions are being made behind the back of official Yerevan.

Ankara’s geopolitical dream of controlling transit from Asia to Europe depends directly on the realization of the project in Syunik, which in Turkish media is no longer even being discussed, it is being presented to the world as a finished product ready for delivery. In this situation, the Armenian leadership’s attempts to frame the demarcation process or the withdrawal of Russian border guards from various sections of Armenia’s border, as a “triumph of statehood” appear as a mockery of the actual state of affairs in a region where borders and transit hubs are being redrawn in accordance with the interests of global players.

Think about it…