Image Credentials: Image Title: Azerbaijan and Armenia Sign US-Brokered Peace Deal at White House Source: (sora.chatgpt) Date: August 2025 Attribution: Created by AI-generated imagery (sora.chatgpt), it does not depict a real-world scene.
By Staff Writer | Open Chronicle with Agencies
Washington – Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a landmark US-brokered peace agreement on Friday, ending decades of hostility and committing to full normalisation of relations. The deal, reached during a meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House, aims to open a new era of diplomatic and economic cooperation between the South Caucasus rivals.
“This is a long time – 35 years – they fought and now they’re friends, and they’re going to be friends for a long time,” Trump said at the ceremony, flanked by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. The agreement commits both nations to respect each other’s territorial integrity, establish diplomatic relations, and end armed conflict.
The accord comes less than two years after Azerbaijan regained full control of Nagorno-Karabakh in 2023, prompting nearly all of the enclave’s 100,000 ethnic Armenians to flee to Armenia.
A key element of the deal is the granting of exclusive US development rights to a strategic transit corridor through the South Caucasus. The White House said the route would facilitate greater exports of energy and other resources. The project, dubbed the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, has already attracted interest from nine companies, including three from the United States.
Armenia and Azerbaijan signed a US-brokered peace agreement in Washington, committing to end decades of hostilities, establish diplomatic relations, and respect each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity https://t.co/jMf9EWrXAc pic.twitter.com/c9sbxcHuzz
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 9, 2025
Trump also announced that separate agreements had been signed with each country to expand cooperation in energy, trade, and technology, including artificial intelligence. Restrictions on US–Azerbaijan defence cooperation have been lifted, a move expected to unsettle Moscow.
Both Aliyev and Pashinyan praised Trump’s role in brokering the deal and pledged to nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize. Trump has sought to position himself as a global peacemaker, pointing to earlier successes in mediating between Cambodia and Thailand, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Pakistan and India.
Analysts say the agreement could transform the South Caucasus, a region rich in energy resources but long divided by closed borders and ethnic strife. Brett Erickson, a sanctions policy expert, said peace would allow the West to address a long-standing loophole in efforts to enforce sanctions against Russia. “The Caucasus has been a blind spot in sanctions policy,” he said.
Tina Dolbaia of the Center for Strategic and International Studies called the agreement a significant symbolic breakthrough, but warned that questions remain about the corridor’s construction and the extent of Armenian and Azerbaijani involvement. Regional expert Olesya Vartanyan noted that the two countries have a history of failed peace efforts, stressing that “without proper and continued US involvement, the issue will likely get deadlocked again.”
Senior US officials described the accord as ending one of several frozen conflicts on Russia’s periphery, signalling a shift in regional dynamics. Armenia plans to grant the US special development rights for the transit route for an extended period.
Rights advocates urged the US to use the diplomatic opening to press for the release of political prisoners in Azerbaijan. The oil-rich nation, which hosted the UN climate summit last year, has dismissed Western criticism of its human rights record as unwarranted interference.
Trump said the agreement is “a win for peace, a win for prosperity, and a win for the future of the region.”