Turkey and Armenia have agreed on university student exchanges as they pursue the normalization of relations, Armenian Deputy Parliament Speaker Vahagn Aleksanyan said Friday, adding that their border could reopen sooner than expected.
Aleksanyan, a member of Armenia’s ruling Civil Contract party, said students from Armenia would travel to Turkey to study and that Turkish students would come to Armenia. He made the remarks during a broadcast on Armenian Public Television.
The announcement follows earlier steps toward academic cooperation. At a meeting in Yerevan on September 12, 2025, Turkish special representative Serdar Kılıç and his Armenian counterpart, Ruben Rubinyan, agreed to strengthen cooperation in culture and academia, particularly by creating scholarship opportunities for university students, according to the Turkish Foreign Ministry.
In March Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said the two countries were discussing scholarship programs for each other’s university students.
Aleksanyan also pointed to progress in air transportation and trade, saying the opening of the Akhalkalaki-Kars railway for Armenian exports had made it possible to transport goods between the two countries via Georgia without commercial intermediaries. He said the pace of normalization had changed considerably in recent years and that the border could reopen sooner than expected, although he did not give a timetable.
Turkey and Armenia have no diplomatic relations, and their land border has remained closed since 1993, when Turkey closed it amid a conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh.
The two countries have taken several steps toward normalization in recent years, including appointing special representatives to lead talks and restoring direct flights. At their fifth meeting, held in July 2024 at the Margara-Alican border crossing, the representatives agreed to assess the technical requirements for reopening the rail crossing between the two countries and to simplify visa procedures for holders of diplomatic and official passports.
In a separate exchange about a domestic dispute involving the Armenian Apostolic Church, Aleksanyan denied opposition accusations that the government was pursuing Turkey’s agenda and accused its critics of promoting Turkey’s image.
Previous efforts to normalize relations have failed to produce an open border. In 2009 Turkey and Armenia signed the Zürich Protocols, which aimed to establish diplomatic relations and reopen the border. The agreements were never ratified amid political disagreements and tensions over Turkey’s alliance with Azerbaijan.
Ankara has continued to link its normalization efforts with Armenia to the broader peace process between Armenia and Azerbaijan, reflecting the importance of its alliance with Baku to its South Caucasus policy.
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