Iran’s continued opposition to the Zangezur Corridor, which was earlier analyzed here and here, is predicated on the assumption that Armenia is very important to its economic and national security. The thinking goes that they’d be harmed if Azerbaijan and/or Turkiye took control of that corridor, which could then cut Iran off from Europe and lead to the emergence of new threats on the border. Few have reflected on the merits of these claims, however, otherwise they’d have realized how shallow they are.
There was only a paltry €4.7 billion worth of trade between the EU and Iran last year, which approximately equates to 1.3% of the country’s $401 billion GDP last year. While it’s unclear how much of that was conducted via Georgia-Armenia, whatever it was had to traverse through the latter’s mountainous Syunik Province to reach the Islamic Republic. It’s cost-prohibitive to build a railway through there so logistics couldn’t ever realistically be scaled up across that route if trade grew.
In that scenario, and if they decide to conduct more of it through multimodal means across the South Caucasus instead of by sea, then it would make sense to do so via Azerbaijan’s Nakhchivan exclave after modernizing its existing rail infrastructure that Syunik Province lacks. This insight suggests that the future of their trade would therefore have to involve Azerbaijan, thereby discrediting the claim that Syunik Province is indispensable to Iran’s economic security.
Seeing as how Azerbaijan would also profit from this through customs duties, there’s no reason to suspect that it would cut off Iranian-EU trade, especially since that could provoke the West’s wrath. The only scenario in which that might happen would be in the event of another war with Armenia or a future one with Iran, in which case Azerbaijan could easily sever Syunik Province if trade hasn’t yet been diversified across Nakhchivan by then, or truckers might just avoid that route on their own.
Segueing into counterarguments against the claim that the worst-case scenario of Azerbaijani and/or Turkish control of Syunik Province outside of a war with Iran would harm the latter’s national security, it’s enough to know that the border with Armenia is a measly 40 kilometers to realize how ridiculous this is. Iran already has a 689-kilometer-long border with Azerbaijan and a 534-kilometer-long one with Turkiye for a total of 1223 kilometers so an expansion of that by 40 kilometers would only make it 3.27% longer.
Whatever security threats that Iran perceives to stem from those two therefore wouldn’t be exacerbated in that worst-case scenario. At the absolute most, it might briefly embolden some Azeri separatists in Iran’s northern regions, but they’ve stirred trouble before only to always be defeated so there’s no reason to expect them to finally succeed in that event. This observation proves that Iran’s national security wouldn’t be adversely affected if Azerbaijan and/or Turkiye controlled the Zangezur Corridor.
While it’s true that this scenario could facilitate Turkiye’s rise as a Eurasian Great Power if it was followed by the creation of a customs union with the Organization of Turkic States (OTS), most of whom are in Central Asia, this wouldn’t automatically pose a threat to Iran. The Islamic Republic would just have to make its own exports to those markets more competitive through whatever means it decides upon, plus Iran is already rising as a Eurasian Great Power in its own right, so everything would balance out.
Considering all this, it’s categorically untrue that Armenia is supposedly very important for Iran’s economic and national security, thus leading to the conclusion that ulterior motives such as elite consolidation or pro-Western signaling are behind its continued opposition to the Zangezur Corridor. Iran would therefore do well to explain the real motivations behind this policy since the explanations put forth by its media surrogates don’t add up and are easily discredited as proven by this analysis.
