Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has proposed that he and Armenia jointly nominate US leader Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize after the two countries reached an agreement to end their long-standing conflict at a ceremony at the White House, BTA reported.
"Perhaps Prime Minister (Nikol) Pashinyan agrees to send a joint proposal to the Nobel Committee to award President Trump the Nobel Peace Prize," Aliyev said at the White House event.
Pashinyan then intervened and took the floor: "I think President Trump deserves to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, and we will defend this idea and call for it.".
Earlier, Trump announced that Pashinyan and Aliyev had committed to lasting peace between their countries.
"Armenia and Azerbaijan commit to permanently halting hostilities, opening (their borders) to trade and travel, and developing diplomatic relations while respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the other side," the Republican said.
The US president added that he was lifting restrictions on military cooperation with Azerbaijan.
The event gives Washington an opportunity to take advantage of Russia's declining influence in the region, the Associated Press reported.
The agreement will create a transit corridor, which will be called the "Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity", the White House announced. The corridor will connect Azerbaijan and the autonomous exclave of Nakhichevan, which are separated from each other by a 32-kilometer strip of Armenian territory. This insistence by Baku has been an insurmountable issue in previous negotiations.
"The roadmap they will agree on will create a foundation for building a cooperative future that will benefit both countries, their shared South Caucasus region, and beyond," White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said today. She added that the new transit corridor will "ensure unhindered connectivity between the two countries, while respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Armenia and its people".
The conclusion of today's agreement is the latest peace or economic agreement negotiated with US mediation this year, and Trump himself does not hide his desire to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in pacifying a number of long-standing conflicts in different parts of the globe, the Associated Press notes.
The peace agreement between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda helped end the long-standing conflict in Eastern Congo. The US also brokered a ceasefire between India and Pakistan, and Trump intervened in the fighting between Cambodia and Thailand, threatening to pull out of trade deals with the warring parties if they did not end their hostilities.
His efforts to halt fighting in Gaza and Ukraine have so far failed.
The agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan – both former Soviet republics – is a geopolitical blow to their former imperial master, Russia, the Associated Press notes. Throughout the 40-year conflict between them, Moscow played the role of a mediator to expand its influence in the strategic South Caucasus region, but that role quickly waned after it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The Trump-brokered deal will allow the United States to strengthen its position in the region as Russia retreats, senior U.S. officials said.
The Trump administration began actively engaging with Armenia and Azerbaijan earlier this year, when Trump's top diplomatic envoy, Steve Witkoff, met with Aliyev in Baku and began discussing what a senior U.S. administration official called a "recharge" of regional relations.
Negotiations on who will build the Trump Road - which would include a rail line, oil and gas pipelines and fiber-optic cables - are likely to begin next week, and at least nine companies have expressed interest in building them, the official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity. He said the Armenians were the ones who suggested naming the corridor after the U.S. leader.