Armenia and Azerbaijan are cautiously testing a future that until recently seemed unthinkable, one defined by freight timetables rather than frontline maps. On October 21, during a visit to Kazakhstan, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev announced that Baku was lifting all restrictions on the transit of goods bound for Armenia, effectively ending a blockade in place for decades. For Armenia, long boxed in and heavily dependent on Russia as a supplier and security guarantor, new routes mean more than symbolism. “This is a classic case where economics is driving peace,” says Grigol Julukhidze, professor of international relations at Caucasus University, speaking to TVP World’s Eastern Express. In his view, the emerging “International Route for Peace and Prosperity,” sometimes dubbed the TRIPP Corridor, could anchor a wider shift from confrontation to connectivity across the South Caucasus. Georgia appears determined not to be left on the sidelines. Tbilisi has offered free rail transit for a fuel shipment from Azerbaijan to Armenia, after Azerbaijani media accused it of sharply raising transit fees. Julukhidze calls that decision “a powerful, tangible signal of regional solidarity and neutrality,” and sees Georgia positioning itself as a potential playmaker in regional supply chains. Still, the academic is quick to caution how fragile this opening remains. He points to external powers, especially Iran and Russia, as key actors uncomfortable with new corridors that bypass their territory and dilute their influence over the region. At home, decades of propaganda have left many in Armenian and Azerbaijani societies steeped in mutual distrust. “Generations were educated on the basis of hatred towards each other,” he warns, suggesting it may take a decade or more before public attitudes catch up with these new maps. For now, the South Caucasus is inching toward peace not through grand ceremonies but through freight trains quietly crossing landscapes once defined by war.
