The Big Story: Breakthrough on Armenian-Turkish Border

What happened: Almost 30 years after Turkey closed its land border with Armenia during the first Nagorno-Karabakh war, the two sides have agreed on a partial reopening. A statement released on 1 July by both sides said they will enable third-country nationals to cross the border “at the earliest date possible.”

More context: As Eurasianet writes, Ankara and Yerevan began slowly repairing ties after Armenia’s defeat in the 2020 war, when Azerbaijan recaptured most of the territory it lost in the first war, leaving just a rump Armenian-inhabited island within Azerbaijani territory. “Armenia is now engaged in complicated and complex twin-track diplomacy: pursuing negotiations with Azerbaijan and a process to normalize relations with Turkey,” Armenian analyst Richard Giragosian writes for the Institute for War & Peace Reporting.

Worth noting: Armenia is also making overtures to Iran, which backs its stance in opposing Azerbaijan’s demand for an extraterritorial land corridor linking Azerbaijan proper with the Nakhchivan exclave, .

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