Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed at the White House a joint declaration described by the U.S. administration as a “path to peace, stability and prosperity.” Trump signed it as a witness.
“With this accord we have finally succeeded in making peace,” Trump declared at the signing ceremony.
“Armenia and Azerbaijan are committing to stop all fighting forever, open up commerce, travel and diplomatic relations, and respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he said.
Trump emphasized that the “momentous” declaration also calls for the opening of a “special transitory that will allow Azerbaijan to get full access to its Nakhichevan territory while fully respecting Armenia’s sovereignty.” Armenia will establish an “exclusive partnership with the United States to develop this corridor, which could extend for up to 99 years,” he said, seemingly confirming reports about a long-term lease on the transit routes sought by Washington.
The U.S. government is reportedly planning to sublease the land to a consortium of private companies. Trump said American companies are already prepared to invest “a lot of money” in what has been officially named the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP).
Aliyev, who has been pressuring Yerevan to open an extraterritorial corridor to Nakhichevan, stressed the importance of the TRIPP in his remarks at the ceremony. Pashinian also touted the transit arrangement condemned by his domestic critics as a sellout.
“Today we reached a significant milestone in Armenia-Azerbaijan relations,” he said.
The corridor would pass through Syunik, the only Armenian region bordering Iran. Armenian opposition leaders say U.S. administration of the movement of people and cargo to and from Nakhichevan would undermine Armenian sovereignty over Syunik. They say it would also put Armenia at loggerheads with Russia and neighboring Iran.
Moscow and Tehran spoke out against the proposed U.S. role after it was revealed last month. A top adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei charged that the U.S. and “certain pan-Turkist movements” want to “sever Iran’s link with the Caucasus and impose a land blockade on Iran and Russia in the region’s south.” He said Tehran will respond with a “policy of active prevention.”
U.S. President Donald Trump waits to greet Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian at the White House, August 8, 2025.
Key details of the TRIPP are not yet known, with the Armenian-Azerbaijani declaration making only a general reference to it. Earlier on Friday, CNN quoted an unnamed Trump administration official as saying that Washington and Yerevan will set up working groups to “fully implement the details of the roadmap over the coming months.”
It also remained unclear when Armenia and Azerbaijan will actually sign the bilateral peace treaty finalized in March this year. In their joint declaration, Aliyev and Pashinian vaguely “acknowledged the need to continue further actions towards the signing and final ratification of the Treaty.”
Baku has made that conditional on a change of Armenia’s constitution and the dissolution of the OSCE Minsk Group on Nagorno-Karabakh. In another unilateral concession, Pashinian agreed on Friday to the liquidation of the presently moribund group.
While rejecting the other Azerbaijani precondition, Pashinian pledged earlier to try to enact a new Armenian constitution through a referendum. Such a vote is unlikely to be held before Armenia’s next parliamentary elections due in June 2026.
Aliyev did not mention the precondition in his remarks at the White House. He said that the initialing of the treaty by the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers “will result in eternal peace in the South Caucasus.”
The legally non-binding declaration does not address other thorny issues such as the delineation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border or the release of at least 23 Armenian prisoners held in Azerbaijan. Nor does it say anything about Nagorno-Karabakh and its ethnic Armenian population that was forced to flee to Armenia following the September 2023 offensive that restored Azerbaijan’s full control over the region.
During a news conference at the White House, a Western journalist wondered whether the Karabakh Armenians will be allowed to return to their homeland. Both Aliyev and Pashinian ignored the question.