Putin paid his first trip to Azerbaijan in six years earlier this week, which was his third meeting with President Ilham Aliyev this year. It’s rare for the Russian leader to travel abroad, thus showing how close ties have become over the past few years. Observers shouldn’t forget that they signed the Declaration on Allied Interaction literally two days before the special operation began in late February 2022 and that Azerbaijan has proudly rebuffed Western pressure to distance itself from Russia since then.
Azerbaijan’s role in multipolarity was elaborated on in detail here, but it can be summarized as facilitating Eurasian integration via its geostrategic position at the crossroads of north-south and east-west trade. It’s the first-mentioned that most directly concerns Russia due to their cooperation on the North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC) that connects it to India via Iran. Putin and Aliyev accordingly referenced their talks about this megaproject during the press conference that followed their meeting.
Aliyev said that “We also thoroughly examined the progress of the North-South project, which is crucial for our interstate relations and for matters concerning regional transport corridors and routes.
I must say that both railway and road sections of the North-South corridor have been successfully launched on the territory of Azerbaijan. Today, we are working actively to upgrade the railway section of this corridor in order to increase its capacity.”
“This means a possibility of transporting 15 million tonnes of cargo or more, up to 30 million, per year, which is quite realistic. In this case, I hope that both Russia and Azerbaijan and other participants in this corridor will continue their activities together.” Putin then said that “I would like to especially note our joint plans regarding the implementation of the North-South project. This will allow us to reach the shores of the Indian Ocean and use these routes for mutual benefit and mutual interest.”
Aliyev’s last remark on this subject is the most important since he’s alluding to Azerbaijan’s problems with India and Iran. The center of their dispute is Armenia, which India openly arms while Iran has denied reports that it does too. Iran also strongly dislikes Azerbaijan’s military ties with Israel and opposes the Zangezur Corridor just like India strongly dislikes Azerbaijan’s military ties with Pakistan and support of its Kashmir policy.
Traditional security dilemmas are responsible for their problems, but the complex nature of what’s taken shape in the region (due to India and Iran’s arming of Armenia) and beyond (due to Azerbaijan’s military ties with Israel and Pakistan) between Azerbaijan on one side and Iran and India on the other makes them particularly difficult to resolve. There might not be any perfect solution either, but separating their mutual military-political suspicions from apolitical economic cooperation is the best way forward.
Azerbaijan would profit by facilitating Iran and India’s trade with Russia and vice versa, but so too would it profit by facilitating the Russian-Iran gas swap that formed the crux of those two’s Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) from late June that was analyzed here . Some tangible progress is being made on both fronts, however, with the first seen by the Azerbaijani-Iranian agreement to build a bridge across the Aras River and the second through Gazprom and SOCAR’s strategic partnership MoU this week.
As regards the former, it’ll streamline connectivity across the fastest and most cost-efficient NSTC corridor (the trans-Caspian and Central Asian branches aren’t as competitive) upon completion so long as Azerbaijani-Iranian ties remain stable. Meanwhile, the latter will help Russia and Iran’s ambitious gas plans become a reality and thus enable Iran to swap Russian gas to India, though this also depends on the future of Azerbaijani-Iranian ties as well as India’s willingness to defy the US’ unilateral sanctions.
Circling back to Putin’s latest trip, the takeaway is that while Eurasian connectivity was at the top of the agenda, the lasting outcome of his talks with Aliyev inordinately depends on the future of Azerbaijani-Iranian relations and to a lesser extent on Azerbaijani-Indian ones too. Those three would benefit so much if they could finally overcome their mutual suspicions, and it’s possible that their shared Russian strategic partner can help them get to that point in order to unlock their collective multipolar potential.
