Trump and Zangezur Corridor: From Pacific Ocean to Atlantic By Ambassador Elin Suleymanov for Daily Express

The British publication Daily Express has released an article by journalist Paul Baldwin, focusing on the peace-making efforts of U.S. President Donald Trump. Caliber.Az reprints the piece with minor modifications.

"A few days ago, at a White House meeting, former Soviet states Azerbaijan and Armenia—locked in conflict since 1988—reached a peace agreement.

I was in Azerbaijan a few months back covering the horror of the 1.5m landmines left by retreating Armenians after the last nasty conflict, and I have to tell you, I did not see this one coming.

Yes, almost every person in authority over there told me they wanted peace, of course they did… but among the rank and file, there was so much anger, mistrust and hatred for Armenia that I was not hopeful.

And yet, Trump the dealmaker has helped bring the two sides together to achieve the impossible.

As he signed the deal in the White House alongside Trump, even Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said: “If not for President Trump and his team and our great friend Steve Witkoff [Trump’s envoy], probably today Armenia and Azerbaijan would have still been in this endless process of negotiation.”

I spoke to Azerbaijan’s ambassador to the UK, Elin Suleymanov, and he was similarly fulsome in his praise for Trump.

He said, “What he did, which is a great tribute to President Trump, is to push the envelope forward, to bring them together and move the process forward. So all the technicalities for the process were achieved, but of course, his political support has been invaluable.

“That's a great thing about President Trump, his genuine commitment to peace.

“I served in Washington as Ambassador during his first term, and I can tell you his commitment to peacemaking and to deal-making is admirable.”

He added that President Biden had walked away from striking an Azerbaijan-Armenia peace negotiation.

“The Biden administration was extremely damaging not just for the peace process, but for overall US interest in the area,” he stated.

But back to that fabulously-named Trump Road.

The President’s reputation as a pragmatic deal-maker has been well-earned, and of course, there is something in the Azerbaijan-Armenia peace deal for the United States.

Thanks to Witkoff shifting Armenia’s previously intractable opposition, US construction firms will now build (and hold 99-year development rights) to the 43 km “Zangezur Corridor” through Armenia - the last piece in the jigsaw of a 10,000 km “new silk road” linking China to Europe, or the Pacific to the Atlantic if you prefer.

The new linking segment will cut transit time for goods by a massive 14 days.

Railways, pipelines, electricity supplies and fibre optic lines are also expected alongside.

Mr Suleymanov said, “If Americans want to lease the road or invest in it and make it work, that's fine. All we want is to have a safe passage for our citizens and our goods from the Azerbaijani mainland and the prosperity it will bring.”

There are, of course, major stumbling blocks in place for the Trump/Putin summit on Ukraine - mainly that neither Zelenskyy nor any European representative will be there. And it is, of course, being billed as talks about talks, but as Mr Suleymanov was celebrating his nation’s promise of real peace, I asked whether he thought Trump could pull off the impossible twice in one week.

He said, “Let's first touch on the differences. In our case, the war ended five years ago; in the Russian Ukraine case, we have an ongoing military situation, and the scale of that war is different.

“One thing remains the same, however, that President Trump does have a desire to resolve this conflict and bring peace, so let's give him a chance to stop the bloodshed and death and destruction of Ukraine.

“Why not? Let's see what he does. He's a peacemaker, a person genuinely committed to peace, so let's see, maybe, maybe…,” Baldwin wrote.