Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan has said that his country could soon start the construction of the TRIPP route that will connect Azerbaijan to its exclave Nakhchivan via southern Armenia. Speaking to Polish TV channel TVP World on October 2, Mirzoyan said discussions have already started in Yerevan over the construction of the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) that will be operated by a US consortium and are expected to finalize soon. Azerbaijan had earlier stated that it had started the construction work on its part of TRIPP road.
Armenia and Azerbaijan signed a peace declaration in Washington in the presence of President Donald Trump on August 8, ending over three decades of conflict and agreeing to construct the 42-kilometer transit road. Under the agreement, the Armenian part of the road will be leased to a US consortium that will operate it.
Mirzoyan told TVP World that the US consortium can also build and then operate pipelines and electricity cables, among other things. "All arrangements are going to be reciprocal. We are also going to use, for instance, the territory of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic [in Azerbaijan] to connect north and south of Armenia by railway. There is no railway connection now," Mirzoyan said.
Touching upon the Peace Declaration whose text was ratified in March, Mirzoyan said Armenia was ready to sign it "as soon as possible". "The Azerbaijani side has some preconditions for it, we don’t share this agenda. Nevertheless, not even waiting for the final signing ceremony of this Peace Treaty, there are also processes that can take place and are taking place even before this. For instance, we discussed the possibility of being more tolerant to each other or even cooperating on international fora, international platforms," Mirzoyan stated.
The foreign minister said a number of joint steps have been taken by both countries, such as the delimitation of 12 kilometers of the shared border and the closing of the OSCE Minsk Group that negotiated the conflict between Baku and Yerevan for nearly 30 years without any progress. The FM stressed that the full reconciliation process will take time.
Mirzoyan's remarks came on the heels of the meeting between Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on the sidelines of the European Political Community (EPC) in Danish capital Copenhagen on October 2. During the one-on-one meeting, the two leaders discussed implementation of the “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity” (TRIPP) project.
The leaders emphasized the significance of regional transportation connections and reiterated their dedication to promoting peace between the two nations. They also agreed to keep direct lines of communication open, reviewed the Washington agreements, and voiced support for concluding the Minsk process.
