Armenia & Azerbaijan To Ink Peace Memorandum Under Trump Mediation

Via Middle East Eye

Azerbaijan and Armenia are expected to sign a memorandum of understanding in Washington on Friday, committing to the pursuit of peace, according to regional sources familiar with the matter who spoke to Middle East Eye. The sources said that US President Donald Trump will host Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan at the White House for the signing ceremony.

Although Armenia and Azerbaijan reached consensus on a draft peace agreement in March, Baku continues to insist on several additional conditions before finalizing the deal. Chief among Azerbaijan’s demands is that Yerevan amend its constitution to remove references to Azerbaijani territory, a step that would require a national referendum in Armenia.

The anticipated White House summit follows a meeting between the two leaders in Abu Dhabi in July. Following the meeting, Aliyev said both countries could finalize the text of the agreement, or at least its main principles, within a few months and then initial them.

“Reaching an agreement on the basic principles, initialing them, and then working on the text can be an option,” Aliyev said, emphasising that such an approach hinges on Armenia amending its constitution.

Sources added that the two leaders are expected to sign a “letter of intent” rather than a draft peace agreement, providing Trump with a diplomatic achievement he has been seeking in the region since last month.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov called his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan on Monday to inform him about the summit, a third regional source told MEE. Turkish foreign ministry sources said that Fidan discussed bilateral and regional issues with Bayramov. MEE has reached out to both Armenian and Azerbaijani governments for comment. 

One of the main sticking points remains the so-called Zangezur Corridor, which would link mainland Azerbaijan to its exclave, Nakhchivan, through Armenian territory. Armenia rejects the term Zangezur Corridor, arguing that it carries irredentist implications for its sovereign territory, known as Syunik.

Last month, US Ambassador Thomas Barrack officially proposed that an American company could lease and operate the corridor for 100 years, aiming to address the concerns of both sides over security and reliability of the transport route. However, Armenia rejected the proposal, stating it would not lease its sovereign territory to any third country.

A regional source familiar with the negotiations told MEE that Turkey initially suggested the idea of a private company, approved by both Armenia and Azerbaijan, managing the corridor. “However, the Armenian side demanded that the company also operate on the Nakhchivan side of the corridor, which was unacceptable to Baku,” the source explained.

I’m here in #Armenia, on the border with #Azerbaijan — with the Lachin Corridor behind me. This was the site or the ethnic cleansing of 120,000 Armenian Christians.

This corridor once connected Armenia proper to Nagorno-Karabakh, or #Artsakh — a part of ancient Armenia, the… pic.twitter.com/9pTqfbQRaC

— Nadine Maenza (@nadinemaenza) July 31, 2025

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan dates back to the 1993 Nagorno-Karabakh war, when Armenian forces seized the disputed enclave – recognized by the United Nations as Azerbaijani territory, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

After a bloody six-week war in late 2020, Azerbaijan launched a military operation in September 2023 to retake Nagorno-Karabakh, resulting in a ceasefire agreement. Most ethnic Armenians fled, and the breakaway region was officially dissolved on January 1, 2024.