“Tensions remain around Armenia's Syunik region,” he said during a meeting of the top defense officials of ex-Soviet states making up the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).
Belousov did not elaborate. He reiterated instead Russia’s offers to help Armenia and Azerbaijan conclude a peace agreement.
Syunik is Armenia’s sole region bordering Iran. Baku wants Yerevan to open a land corridor connecting Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through the mountainous region. It accuses the Armenian side of not complying with a relevant provision of a Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement that stopped the 2020 Armenian-Azerbaijani war in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The clause commits Armenia to opening rail and road links between Nakhichevan and the rest of Azerbaijan that would be overseen or monitored by Russian border guards. The Armenian government insists that it does not stipulate that people and cargo transported to and from Nakhichevan must be exempt from Armenian border checks.
Last August, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov likewise accused Yerevan of “sabotaging” the agreement. Iran, which strongly opposes the so-called “Zangezur corridor,” reacted angrily to that statement, warning Moscow against contributing to any “geopolitical changes” in the region.
Lavrov has not publicly made more such comments since then, including during his official visit to Yerevan last week. He said the visit helped to further ease Russian-Armenian tensions.
In January this year, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev renewed his implicit threats to open the extraterritorial corridor by force. The move stoked widespread concerns in Armenia about a fresh Azerbaijani military attack.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke of a “real risk” of an Azerbaijani invasion of Armenia when he testified before Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives last week. “We would like to prevent that from happening,” Rubio said.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian on Wednesday again ruled out the possibility of a fresh military conflict with Azerbaijan. “There will be no war, there will be peace,” he said in a speech.