Amid pronouncements about the war in Ukraine and confrontation with the West, Vladimir Putin devoted time at June’s St Petersburg Economic Forum to discussing the state of relations with the former Soviet republics sandwiched between Russia and Iran.
His comments came three days before Armenia’s parliamentary elections and the failure of Moscow’s campaign to derail Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s re-election.
Russia’s drive to reassert influence over Yerevan stems from two strategic imperatives: regaining its leverage in the post-2020 peace process between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and preserving its leading role in regional energy and infrastructure projects in an area it likes to call the near abroad. While Moscow has adopted a bellicose tone toward Armenia and has pushed its proxies to resist Pashinyan’s pro-European government, it has stepped up its efforts for reconciliation with Azerbaijan after years of strained relations. Putin even asserted that Russia has “good relations with Azerbaijan. They have always been good and remain so, both in the economy and in the political sphere,” he said.
The truth is that Moscow–Baku ties deteriorated sharply after an AZAL jet was hit by a Russian missile in December 2024, killing 38 people. Azerbaijan demanded an apology and compensation, maintaining a firm and uncompromising position, and has since accused Moscow of intentionally attacking its embassy in Kyiv three times. Russia has also been frustrated by both Azerbaijan’s and Armenia’s ties with President Donald Trump’s administration, particularly over critically important transport infrastructure. The Armenian election and the defeat of pro-Putin candidates pushed the Kremlin to work harder to rekindle its relationship with Azerbaijan as it seeks to reassert itself in the region.
The recalibration comes in the face of increasingly complex regional dynamics, intensifying competition over transport corridors, and the ongoing transformation of Eurasia’s economies.
Closer ties with the West will have a “negative impact” on Armenia’s finances, Moscow warned, and it has threatened to switch to imports from its rivals. “If Armenia cuts off trade relations with Russia, we will turn toward Azerbaijan,” Putin’s special representative Boris Titov said.
As well as trade, Russia’s goals in Azerbaijan have focused on logistics and transportation due to its geographical proximity to Iran, Turkey, and Central Asia. Closer ties with Baku would allow Moscow to retain influence over regional transit routes, including the International North-South Transit Corridor (INSTC), an objective it has pursued for more than two decades.
The corridor offers Russia a gateway to southern markets through Iran and the Persian Gulf, and a diplomatic thaw would enable Moscow to seek completion of the missing section of the Rasht-Astara railway, via Azerbaijani territory, to make the route through Iran fully operational. Russia has largely been a bystander to the resurgence of the east-west Middle Corridor, a major alternative trade route linking China and Europe via the Caspian basin, and to plans for the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) across Armenia’s Syunik province. It is eager to shoehorn itself into the latter project and is pressuring Armenia to accommodate its interests.
The Kremlin’s renewed emphasis on energy, trade, and logistics in its overtures to Azerbaijan, reinforced by Putin’s claims in St Petersburg, signals that Moscow sees Baku wielding significant influence over the region’s energy and transportation dynamics. For its part, Azerbaijan will seek to pragmatically leverage Moscow’s more positive rhetoric to maintain a balanced relationship.
But it is unlikely to show much enthusiasm for deepening ties with Russia, given the regional volatility and rising security risks. Instead, it will seek to preserve its existing high-level partnerships with Europe, Turkey, China, and Central Asia, which offer it greater strategic diversification and stability.
Fuad Shahbazov is a policy analyst covering regional security issues in the Eurasian region. He regularly provides his short geopolitical insights at @fuadshahbazov.
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