Armenia has been seeking ways to emerge from its self-isolation for some time now. Lately, ideas and projects such as the Middle Corridor, Zangazur Corridor, and North-South Corridor have come to the forefront, with Azerbaijan playing an important role. This initiative has found itself as a trend in Yerevan for almost half a decade.

This time, Armenia found a new way by officially joining the Ashgabat Agreement, a long-standing but underdeveloped framework aimed at creating an international transport and transit corridor between Iran, the Sultanate of Oman, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The decision, approved by the Armenian government on May 8, underscores Yerevan’s desire to integrate into regional transport initiatives and secure a foothold in broader trade networks that bypass Azerbaijan.

The Ashgabat Agreement, originally signed in 2011, aims to establish reliable and efficient multimodal transport corridors—integrating road, rail, and sea—across member states. It seeks to facilitate the movement of goods and passengers, reduce logistics costs, harmonise customs procedures, and increase the transit profile of participating countries. Though Qatar, one of the initial signatories, withdrew in 2013, the agreement gradually expanded to include Kazakhstan, Pakistan, and India in later years. However, real progress in implementation has remained modest. The agreement, which officially came into force in 2016, has since been joined by India, Pakistan, and Kazakhstan. However, despite its legal status, the project has seen limited practical development over the past decade, with implementation efforts only accelerating slightly after........

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