It was advised on the first of the year that “India & Azerbaijan Should Reset Their Relations For The Greater Multipolar Good”. Their ties with the other’s respective Pakistani and Armenian rivals led to mutual mistrust that risks impeding their cooperation on the North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC). Both countries also found themselves under newfound American pressure over “democracy”, “human rights”, and other pretexts aimed at punishing them for their independent foreign policies.
While it remains unclear whether the political will exists on either side to make progress on this proposal, the stage is certainly set for if they decide to do so. Congress began deliberating the “Azerbaijan Sanctions Review Act of 2024” last month, while a State Department spokesman ominously hinted that his country could sanction India for its newly clinched 10-year port deal with Iran. This places those two in the same boat since they’re now regarded by American policymakers as “frenemies”.
On top of that, Armenia’s surprise return of four occupied Azerbaijani villages and Prime Minister Pashinyan’s seemingly sincere desire to finally conclude their border delimitation talks with a view towards speedily signing a peace deal afterwards bodes well for Azerbaijani-Indian relations. In that event, India’s arms exports to Armenia that riled President Aliyev as recently as last month would no longer be regarded as problematic, thus removing one of the greatest obstacles to their rapprochement.
The trouble though is that it’s not known whether Pashinyan will survive the latest Color Revolution attempt against him that’s orchestrated by the US via its allied ultra-nationalist Armenian diaspora and CIA-backed “NGOs” as punishment for his latest peace push. It also can’t be taken for granted that neighboring Georgia will survive its own ongoing such attempt either, which is being advanced by the US with the aim of installing a compliant regime that would then facilitate NATO arms exports to Armenia.
The US envisaged turning Armenia into its bastion of regional influence for dividing-and-ruling the South Caucasus, the role of which Pashinyan was happy to fulfill from 2020 onwards and especially after his country’s latest defeat by Azerbaijan last September. He eventually realized the futility of sparking a new war with Azerbaijan over its recently occupied western regions, however, and thus began to engage in the earlier mentioned border delimitation talks that threw a wrench in the US’ hegemonic plans.
Should Armenia and Georgia weather these interconnected Color Revolution storms, and keeping in mind the US’ newfound perceptions of Azerbaijan and India as “frenemies”, then the last two might patch up their problems. Their shared commitment to the NSTC serves as the geo-economic logic for driving this diplomatic development, which would be facilitated by an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace deal that neutralizes Baku’s threat perception of Delhi’s arms exports to Yerevan.
Although they’re private outlets, the positive assessment that AzerNews and News.Az’s interviewed experts just gave of India’s newly clinched port deal with Iran could be interpreted as a signal that some in Azerbaijan are interested in improving relations with India. Accordingly, any similarly positive assessment of Azerbaijan’s role in the NSTC by private Indian media’s interviewed experts could be interpreted as signaling interest in improving relations with Azerbaijan, which could help break the ice.
Their diplomats might still be a bit shy about making the first move in exploring this long-awaited rapprochement, but in that case, they could rely on their shared Russian partner to help them get the ball rolling, whose strategic interests are advanced by optimizing the NSTC in which they all participate. If the political will is present, which can’t be taken for granted as was earlier mentioned, then tangible progress could be made by sometime this summer in the best-case scenario.
