Azerbaijan is trying to present a new border checkpoint as a demonstration of how peacefully Karabakh Armenians could live under Azerbaijani rule. But they continue to face deep skepticism from Armenians who are refusing to use the crossing and submit to Azerbaijani border control.

Azerbaijani forces first set up the post on April 23 on the sole road connecting Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh, known as the Lachin corridor. A week later, Azerbaijani state TV released video of the border post in action, with a handful of Armenians using the crossing. 

Azerbaijani state-affiliated media reported that on that day, April 30, eleven people had used the checkpoint: eight to cross from Karabakh to Armenia and three going in the opposite direction. Since then, though, no new numbers have been released. 

A spokesperson for Azerbaijan’s State Border Service had not responded to a query from Eurasianet by the time this story was posted. Since April 30, no residents of Armenia or Karabakh have crossed the border, Artak Beglaryan, an adviser to Karabakh’s de facto state minister, told Eurasianet.

The de facto authorities are discouraging Karabakh residents from using the border crossing. Given Azerbaijan’s record of violence against and intimidation of Armenians, Karabakh residents shouldn’t trust the assurances from Baku that the passage through the border will be safe, Beglaryan argued. 

“Since there are real security risks for our citizens, we cannot ensure proper security there,” Beglaryan told Eurasianet. “That's why it is not recommended to freely travel using the checkpoint, even if it seems possible at first glance.” Beglaryan said officials had been giving public interviews recommending that residents not use the checkpoint.

Azerbaijan has tried to present the checkpoint as a normal border crossing no different from any other around the world. A video released by state television on May 1 depicted a handful of Armenians going through standard border procedures, handing over their passports to Azerbaijani border guards, submitting to cursory examinations of their car trunks, and communicating easily in Russian with the guards.

What really happened, though, is difficult to discern.

Some observers noted that the video appeared to have blurred out the presence of Russian peacekeepers’ vehicles that were on the scene as the Armenians were crossing the border; a key part of Baku’s narrative about Karabakh is that its Armenian residents can live freely under Azerbaijani rule without any international presence or monitoring.

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Karabakh officials called the video a “cheap show” and said it had been manipulated. A statement from the de facto state minister effectively blamed the Russian peacekeepers: it said that the Armenians who had been filmed had first crossed from Karabakh into Armenia, with an escort of Russian peacekeepers, who “gave assurances that there would be no monitoring by the Azerbaijani side.” But when the people returned back home to Karabakh, they “encountered Azerbaijanis at the checkpoint,” the statement said. “The latter, having put our citizens in an impossible position, forced them to carry out their demands, filming the process to show another staged show.”

Since then, the border post has been unused, though Baku continues to present it as a demonstration of their good will. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan complained on May 4 that the establishment of the checkpoint “escalated” the humanitarian crisis there; the Azerbaijan Foreign Ministry said in its response that “Armenian residents have already begun to pass [the border checkpoint] transparently in both directions.”

Some Karabakh residents have launched demonstrations against the border post, with protesters holding signs reading “The checkpoint is a red line” and “We won’t accept it, we won’t pass.” Participants appealed to the international community, including the United Nations, the United States, Russia, and Armenia, to take action to remove the checkpoint. 

The use of the checkpoint is amounting to a real-life test of a potential Azerbaijani control over the territory, as the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan have just completed four days of negotiations in Washington on what could be a comprehensive peace agreement to resolve their decades-old conflict. 

The most fraught issue continues to be the status of Karabakh. Armenia is seeking some kind of international security guarantees for the ethnic Armenian population there, while Azerbaijan insists that the rights of its citizens are a matter for Baku alone to decide. 

A Western diplomat familiar with the negotiations argued that the checkpoint, in the absence of efforts to convince Armenians that they will be safe under Azerbaijani control, only undermines the trust that would be necessary for the Armenians to come to an agreement on Karabakh.

“It [the checkpoint] unsettles the Armenians and the Karabakhis,” the diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “If Baku is genuine about wanting to reassure the Armenians of Karabakh that they can stay in safety and security then, whether you have a checkpoint or not you have to send some reassuring signals.” 

Meanwhile, the Russian peacekeeping contingent abruptly announced that it had rotated commanders; on April 26, just three days after the post was first erected, Russia’s defense ministry announced that it had appointed a new commander, effective the day before.

That officer, General Aleksandr Lentsov, then quickly headed to Baku for consultations. On May 4 he met with Azerbaijan Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov, the Azerbaijani MoD reported; neither side made any comments following the meeting.