The first meeting of the delegations of Turkey and Armenia on the functioning of the Margara/Alijan border checkpoint is scheduled for early next week, NTV reports, citing Turkish diplomatic sources.
„A delegation led by Ambassador Serdar Kılıç will leave for Armenia via the Alijan checkpoint early next week. At the first meeting of the intergovernmental delegations, "decisions may be made to normalize relations between the countries, and officials may also discuss the implementation of previously adopted decisions," the channel reported.
During previous meetings, Deputy Speaker of the Armenian Parliament Ruben Rubinyan and Kaluch agreed to resume cargo flights and prepare infrastructure to open the border. They also reached an agreement to simplify visa procedures for holders of diplomatic passports and allow citizens of third countries to cross the border, but these decisions have not yet entered into force, the channel notes.
The meeting will be held for the first time since the agreement on the Zangezur Corridor or “Trump Road“.
Kılıç and Rubinyan have held five meetings before, the last of which took place at the checkpoint in July 2024.
In early August 2025, following a meeting between Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and the presidents of the United States and Azerbaijan, Donald Trump and Ilham Aliyev, in Washington, a declaration was adopted on the initialing by the foreign ministers of the two Transcaucasian republics of the agreed text of the agreement on the establishment of peace and interstate relations between Yerevan and Baku. Armenia also agreed to cooperate with the United States and third countries to create the “Trump Road for International Peace and Prosperity“, connecting Azerbaijan with its Nakhchivan autonomy through the territory of Armenia.
There are no diplomatic relations between Turkey and Armenia, the border between the two countries has been closed since 1993 at the initiative of Ankara. The complicated relations between the countries are caused by a number of circumstances related to Ankara's support for the Azerbaijani position on Karabakh and Turkey's sharp reaction to the process of international recognition of the Armenian genocide of 1915 in the Ottoman Empire. In January 2022, the first meeting of the special representatives for the normalization process between Armenia and Turkey, Deputy Speaker of the Armenian Parliament Ruben Rubinyan and former Turkish Ambassador to the United States Serdar Kilic, was held in Moscow. As reported by the Russian Foreign Ministry, during the talks the parties showed readiness for a constructive and non-politicized dialogue. Several more meetings were held in Vienna. On July 1, 2022, during the meeting between Rubinyan and Kaluch in Vienna, an agreement was reached to ensure the possibility of crossing the Armenian-Turkish land border for third-country nationals as soon as possible.