Nakhchivan

An exclave on the Aras

Nakhchivan sits on the southern edge of the Transcaucasian plateau. Armenia lies to its north and east, and the Aras river separates it from Iran and a short stretch of Türkiye to the south and west. It is mostly mountains, with a plain in the west and southwest.^[1] Almost everyone who lives there is Azerbaijani, and farming depends on irrigation.^[1]

Its capital has a history going back to about 1500 BCE, and Persians, Armenians, Mongols and Turks all competed for the area before it passed to Russia in 1828.^[1]

Cut off in 1921

After the Red Army took the region in July 1920, the Soviets first assigned it to Armenia and then to Azerbaijan. The borders they drew left Armenia’s Syunik province between Nakhchivan and the rest of Azerbaijan.^[3]

Two treaties between Soviet Russia and Türkiye in 1921, the Treaty of Moscow and the Treaty of Kars, placed Nakhchivan under Azerbaijan’s protection and made Moscow and Ankara guarantors of its status and borders.^[3] It became an autonomous republic in 1924, and part of independent Azerbaijan in 1991.^[1]

Under Soviet rule people could travel across Armenia between Nakhchivan and the rest of Azerbaijan. The war over Nagorno-Karabakh that began in 1988 closed that route, and Nakhchivan was cut off by land from the rest of the country.^[3]

What its autonomy means

Azerbaijan’s constitution calls Nakhchivan “an autonomous State which forms part of the Republic of Azerbaijan” and an “inalienable part” of it. Azerbaijan’s laws and presidential decrees apply there.^[2] It has its own constitution, parliament, cabinet and courts. Its parliament, the Ali Majlis, has 45 members elected for five years, and its speaker is Nakhchivan’s highest official.^[2]

The Ali Majlis passes Nakhchivan’s budget and economic programmes. It appoints the prime minister, but only on the proposal of Azerbaijan’s president.^[2]

“The Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic is an autonomous State which forms part of the Republic of Azerbaijan.”^[2]

A route across Armenia

After Azerbaijan retook most of Karabakh in 2020, it pressed again for a land link to Nakhchivan across Armenia, which Azerbaijanis call the Zangezur corridor.^[3] At a meeting in Washington in August 2025, Armenia and Azerbaijan took steps toward peace and agreed plans for a US-run transport route between Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan, the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP). Russia and Iran have opposed changes in the region.^[3]

In February 2026 Azerbaijan’s parliament approved a request from Nakhchivan’s parliament to remove the references to the 1921 treaties from Nakhchivan’s constitution, leaving its status and borders to Baku alone.^[3]