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Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan praised Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s decision to lift restrictions on freight transit.
PM Nikol Pashinyan welcomed the move in his speech at the 2025 Tbilisi Silk Road Forum in the Georgian capital.
Welcoming the participants and thanking Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze for organizing the event, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said it was a great honor for him to take part in the forum for the second time. He described the forum as an important platform for interaction among officials from various countries, the private sector, and international experts, as well as for the exchange of new ideas.
Pashinyan had unveiled the Crossroads of Peace project at the 2023 Tbilisi Silk Road Forum.
“Speaking at the Silk Road Forum in October 2023, I first presented the “Crossroads of Peace” initiative—an undertaking by the Government of Armenia—right from this very platform. Since then, the project has received recognition and support from many of our international partners.
Pashinyan underscored that the core idea of the aforementioned project is to develop regional and international transport connectivity through the territory of the Republic of Armenia — not only toward Georgia and Iran, but also in the direction of Azerbaijan and Türkiye, through the opening of borders with those countries.
Prime Minister Pashinyan gladly noted that Armenia has achieved significant success in this regard.
"On August 8, 2025, with the support and initiative of U.S. President Donald Trump, the President of Azerbaijan and I signed the Declaration of Peace in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. The declaration was also signed by President Trump as a witness," the Prime Minister stated.
Pashinyan emphasized that the declaration makes special reference to regional transit routes. He read the third point of the declaration: “We reaffirmed the importance of the opening of communications between the two countries for intra-state, bilateral, and international transportation for the promotion of peace, stability, and prosperity in the region and in its neighborhood on the basis of respect for the sovereignty, territorial integrity, and jurisdiction of the States. These efforts are to include unimpeded connectivity between the main part of the Republic of Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic through the territory of the Republic of Armenia with reciprocal benefits for international and intra-state connectivity for the Republic of Armenia.”
The Prime Minister noted that Azerbaijan has taken an important step toward the implementation of this point in the Washington Declaration.
"President Aliyev announced the day before that Azerbaijan is lifting restrictions on the transit of goods through its territory. This is an extremely important announcement, and I would like to express my appreciation to the President of Azerbaijan for this step and to welcome the statement," PM Nikol Pashinyan said.
According to him, something that seemed “unthinkable” just a few months ago is now happening: grain is being imported into Armenia from Kazakhstan via Azerbaijan and Georgia.
For this development, the Prime Minister of Armenia also expressed his appreciation to the President of Kazakhstan and the Prime Minister of Georgia.