Explaining how he imagines the peace agreement with Azerbaijan, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that he believes there should be ‘no enclaves or exclaves on either side of the border’ as part of the peace agreement with Azerbaijan, and that the two countries should exchange territories of corresponding sizes.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have four enclave and exclave clusters that have become the subject of political controversy in the process of demarcation and delimitation between the two countries.
Karki, Barkhudarlyu and Yukhari Askipara — Yukhari and Askipara are two separate villages that form a single cluster — are located in Armenia but are part of Azerbaijan according to the Almaty Declaration of 1991. Artsvashen, which is currently under Azerbaijani control, is considered to be part of Armenia.
The enclaves were created in the 1920s when Soviet authorities drew internal borders within the Transcaucasian Federation based on their demographic makeup, rather than geography. Consequently, a cluster of Azerbaijani villages could legally become part of Azerbaijan while surrounded by Armenia, and Armenia’s Artsvashen village could end up cut off inside Azerbaijani territory. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has previously demanded the return of Armenian exclaves that were Azerbaijani territory during the Soviet Union.
Pashinyan says his vision for peace with Azerbaijan includes Armenia with a territory of 29,743 square kilometres, with borders as defined in the Alma-Ata Declaration. He added that the transit between the two countries should not be limited to the Trump Route (TRIPP) under any agreement.
‘Now, the next and perhaps most important question is whether there is a real possibility of giving peace this form. Based on the results of my engagements with the President of Azerbaijan in Turkmenistan, I have the preliminary impression that we have an opportunity to give peace such a form, and in the coming period we will be engaged in realising this opportunity, turning this possibility into reality’, said Pashinyan.
Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev did not have an official meeting in Turkmenistan, where they both attended the Caspian Environmental Summit on 9 October. Russian media had reported that Pashinyan met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Aliyev on the sidelines of the event, but Pashinyan’s office denied the reports on Monday.
The Armenia–Azerbaijan peace process entered a new stage after the 2025 US-mediated Washington summit, which brought together Pashinyan, Aliyev, and US President Donald Trump, and resulted in the initialling — but not the signing — of a peace treaty. The border delimitation, enclaves, and exclaves remain some of the most important steps on the way to signing a peace agreement.