Armenia rules out NATO membership, alliance’s presence on its territory

Armenia does not seek membership in NATO and will not allow any presence of the alliance on its territory, Chairman of the Armenian National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Foreign Relations Sargis Khandanyan said.

Khandanyan made the remarks during a briefing, addressing speculation over Armenia’s cooperation with NATO, Caliber.Az cites Armenian media outlets.

“Yerevan has certain frameworks of cooperation with NATO, but they do not envisage the physical presence of this structure, especially in the context of TRIPP [Trump Route], which is a purely infrastructural project,” he said.

Khandanyan emphasised that Armenia’s engagement with the alliance remains limited in scope and does not imply any shift toward NATO membership or the deployment of alliance infrastructure in the country.

Armenia has maintained a pragmatic relationship with NATO since joining the Partnership for Peace program in 1994 and adopting an Individual Partnership Action Plan (IPAP) in 2005. IPAP includes participation in NATO-led missions, joint exercises like Eagle Partner, defence education and reform support.

The Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP), also referred to as Zangezur Corridor, established under the August 8, 2025, U.S.-brokered Armenia-Azerbaijan peace declaration, is a 43 km multimodal transit route (rail, highway, pipelines) through Armenia's Syunik Province linking Azerbaijan to its exclave Nakhchivan. Operated under Armenian sovereignty with a 99-year U.S.-led consortium lease, it is explicitly civilian and economic—no military components or foreign forces.

By Khagan Isayev