Welcome to the South Caucasus Brief, a monthly update from the Institute for Security Analysis. Now more than ever, stakeholders need clarity and cohesion when it comes to South Caucasus policy. In this newsletter, ISA’s experts provide personal observations and analysis on overlooked developments reshaping the South Caucasus.

Leading this month

Ahead of this weekends’s high-stakes elections, Armenia is in the throes of a political frenzy marked by a surge in disinformation and foreign interference. Over the past several weeks, Yerevan has hosted a series of high-profile diplomatic engagements — including the European Political Community summit — widely viewed as vehicles to bolster the ruling party’s electoral fortunes and burnish the authorities’ specious pro-Western credentials.

The Trump administration has also enthusiastically waded into Armenia’s electoral cycle. In recent months, Washington has dispatched several top officials to Yerevan — including Vice President JD Vance. And just last week, Secretary of State Marco Rubio briefly touched down in Yerevan en route from India. While Rubio’s agenda officially focused on the “Trump Route for Peace & Prosperity” (TRIPP) and critical materials cooperation, the visit served as a de facto endorsement of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s candidacy.

(This was later effectively confirmed by Trump himself, who declared in a follow-up statement that: “Nikol has my COMPLETE and TOTAL Endorsement for Re-Election on June 7, 2026.”)

To secure ironclad international support, Armenian authorities have framed the elections as a litmus test for curtailing Russian clout. This narrative has been eagerly amplified by foreign media outlets. Yet, upon closer inspection, the argument lacks merit. The Pashinyan administration has long alleged Russian meddling to gain sway with Western audiences — and minimize the perception of Russia’s role across regional affairs. Despite these theatrics, Yerevan maintains robust ties with Moscow.

In fact, amid highly publicized brawls with Yerevan — including threats of agricultural bans, energy restrictions, and explicit political pressure — the Kremlin has also issued statements supportive of Pashinyan. On May 25, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated: “Armenia and Russia continue to maintain friendly relations. We are engaged in the most advanced integration processes with Armenia.” And earlier this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent birthday greetings to Pashinyan.

Seasoned observers suggest that the latest bout of bilateral tensions serves to boost Pashinyan’s electoral fortunes. (Russia often stages tensions with Armenia — and Azerbaijan — to manipulate Western stakeholders and domestic audiences.) According to a well placed diplomatic source, the Kremlin is not interested in replacing Pashinyan with a more overtly pro-Russian figure such as Robert Kocharyan or Samvel Karapetyan.

Instead, the Kremlin prefers a government in Yerevan that projects a pro-Western image while advancing Russian interests. This arrangement serves as a form of geopolitical camouflage, providing the Kremlin with greater margin of maneuver to covertly shape regional affairs — and conduct sanctions-evasion operations. In a recent interview, Kremlin propagandist Maxim Shevchenko confirmed this modus operandi, admitting that “Pashinyan’s removal is not currently part of Putin’s plans.”

This plan — preserving Pashinyan while simultaneously maintaining strong pro-Russian forces within Armenia’s political system — is partly attributed to Sergey Kiriyenko, a top Kremlin official overseeing Russia’s near abroad. A seasoned political manipulator, Kiriyenko has a long track record of staging elections and establishing controlled opposition parties. And this latest arrangement is poised to deliver continuous dividends for Moscow. By perpetuating Armenia’s political dysfunction, the Kremlin is creating ideal conditions for sustained foreign interference — and state capture.

With international stakeholders consumed by the staged geopolitical tussle around upcoming elections, the Armenian authorities’ intensifying domestic crackdown has largely escaped notice. In recent months, the government has cast a wide net against a host of critics — targeting civilians, civil society figures and political actors.

During a recent campaign event in the Lori region, Pashinyan lashed out at Artyom Grigoryan, who confronted the prime minister over the deaths of 15 young soldiers killed in the 2023 Azat military barracks fire — including Grigoryan’s only grandson. Pashinyan screamed at the grieving grandfather, accused him of being an “agent,” while security personnel dragged him away.

And perhaps even more ominous is the prosecution of Artur Osipyan, a civic-political activist from Nagorno-Karabakh. Osipyan drew the authorities’ ire after publicly confronting Pashinyan over the peace process and the fate of Artsakh Armenians. The prime minister responded with a personal tirade, accusing the activist of being a pro-Russian stooge. (Armenian authorities regularly label critics, domestic and foreign alike, as “warmongers” and “pro-Russian.”) The accusation is particularly ironic given Osipyan’s background: he is known for openly protesting Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno-Karabakh, at considerable personal risk.

Following the confrontation with Pashinyan, authorities detained Osipyan, who has since launched a hunger strike in prison. (This wanton crackdown likely presages a wave of post-election repression.)

As the campaign winds down, Armenians are weighing a range of potential scenarios. Yet given its extensive abuse of state resources and the opposition’s ineptitude, Civil Contract appears well-positioned to retain power.

Regardless of the outcome, the elections are poised to reproduce a polarized, compromised political elite. The next government will likely have neither the interest nor the capacity to extract the country from its perpetual cycle of geopolitical crises. Instead, Armenia’s political dysfunction will continue to provide fertile ground for the geopolitical designs of regional heavyweights, particularly Azerbaijan and Russia.

What we are watching

Sovereignty manipulated.Throughout the election cycle, sovereignty has become a fixture of Armenia’s political discourse. Politicians of all stripes routinely invoke the concept. Pro-government circles frame the upcoming polls as a unique opportunity for the country to escape Russia’s grasp. And opposition groups exclusively focus on the government’s concessions vis-à-vis Azerbaijan — conveniently ignoring Moscow’s strategic partnership with Baku. Yet neither camp has displayed a genuine interest in reversing the recent erosion of Armenian sovereignty.

Successive Armenian administrations have failed to burnish the country’s sovereignty. Former president Levon Ter-Petrosyan, often deferential to Russian interests, squandered opportunities to translate Armenia’s military victory in Nagorno-Karabakh into broader geopolitical gains. His successor, Robert Kocharyan, later ceded critical infrastructure to Russia through murky debt-for-assets swaps. Subsequent governments continued the trend, outsourcing sensitive portfolios — particularly around national security — to external patrons, to devastating effect (i.e., the collapse of Nagorno-Karabakh).

Today, Armenia has entered a new geopolitical era — a phase marked by the near-complete erosion of its sovereignty and national viability. Both Russia and Azerbaijan, working in tandem, exert significant influence over Yerevan’s strategic decision-making. And following the elections, Azerbaijan appears intent on accelerating Armenia’s integration into its political and economic orbit.

The much-touted TRIPP corridor remains a central plank in Azerbaijan’s efforts to consolidate influence in Armenia’s southern environs. While ostensibly geared toward economic integration, the proposed scheme — which involves an external oversight mechanism — is poised to curtail Armenian sovereignty over the strategic zone. (Despite the Trump administration’s role in advancing the scheme, many observers also argue that sustained U.S. engagement is far from guaranteed and that control could ultimately revert to Azerbaijan.)

(Israel is pursuing a similar strategy in Lebanon and Syria — advancing proposals for demilitarized buffer zones and externally managed economic corridors — to formalize its influence in border regions.)

The post-election period is likely to witness further concessions vis-à-vis Azerbaijan. During a recent speech, Pashinyan declined to rule out the eventual transfer of several disputed enclaves — several of which are situated near critical infrastructure, including the Armenia–Georgia highway. These incremental concessions are set to further erode Armenian sovereignty and reduce the country’s already limited strategic depth.

Iranian influence networks.Since the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, Iran has expanded its influence infrastructure in Armenia. Amid seismic geopolitical shifts, Iranian officials have increasingly cast Tehran as a defender of Armenian territorial integrity — and a guarantor of regional stability. And recent polling suggests this narrative is yielding dividends: 53 percent of Armenians now identify Iran as the country’s top political partner.

Tehran’s burnished image is the product of a robust soft-power campaign. In recent years, Iran launched a consulate in Kapan, while expanding its diplomatic footprint in Yerevan. And to build out its local rolodex, Iranian diplomats routinely sponsor study tours to Iran for Armenian academics and analysts. The impact of these engagements is increasingly visible across Armenia’s media landscape. A growing legion of commentators — often offering little rigorous analysis — routinely lavish praise on Iran and frame the country as a critical counterweight to Turkey and Azerbaijan.

A critical omission from this rosy narrative is Iran’s pragmatic relationship with Azerbaijan. Despite the popular narrative of bilateral animosity — and a string of public brawls — Baku-Tehran ties remain cordial. The two countries coordinate across key portfolios (i.e., trade, transportation and energy). Iran and Azerbaijan also share geopolitical objectives in the South Caucasus — chief among them, the reduction of Western influence. Both states prefer regional, authoritarian-driven conflict management schemes (i.e., the 3+3 format) — which is to Armenia’s disadvantage.

By overlooking Baku–Tehran cooperation, analysts risk mischaracterizing the degree of alignment between Armenian and Iranian interests. And skewed assumptions about competing interests can — and often do — distort Armenia’s national security calculus, a lesson underscored by the events of 2020.

Brief reprieve. In late April, Abkhaz MP Kana Kvarchia scored a small yet significant reprieve in a long-running legal saga around trumped-up robbery charges. Abkhazia’s parliament refused to strip the opposition lawmaker of his parliamentary immunity — despite pressure from the Prosecutor General’s Office and a ruling by the Supreme Court of Abkhazia.

Previously, Moscow placed Kana Kvarchia — along with Abkhaz politicians Eshsou Kakalia and Khina Dumaa — on its federal most-wanted list on bogus robbery charges. (The alleged victims were Russian political strategists deployed to Sukhumi ahead of the municipal elections.)

Despite this legal reprieve, which effectively squashes further criminal proceedings within Abkhazia, Moscow appears intent on continuing to pursue the case. Russian prosecutors recently transferred the case to Sochi — a move widely interpreted as a political warning to Abkhazia’s increasingly assertive sovereignty camp.

This judicial campaign is the latest bout in a sustained Russian effort to cull Abkhazia’s political elite. Observers increasingly view the Moscow-directed opposition crackdown as an attempt to reshape the territory’s political order ahead of the 2027 parliamentary elections. Several Abkhaz commentators warn that the prosecutions aim to sideline nationalist and opposition networks while incentivizing the emergence of a more overtly pro-Russian parliamentary bloc.

Deals and visits ✈️

• Slovakia seeks long-term gas deal with Azerbaijan
• SOCAR expands Georgia’s Kulevi oil terminal
• Georgia boosts fertilizer imports from Russia
• Kremlin-aligned Moldovan delegation visits Tbilisi
• Georgia, Azerbaijan resume passenger railway service

What we are reading

• Israel’s quiet grain dealings with Russia (ZN.UA)
• How Moscow trains students into spies and hackers (VSquare)
• Chinese cyber outfit targets Azerbaijan’s energy sector (Security Affairs)
• Armenian authorities trade tax privileges for political donations (Infocom)
• Kyrgyzstan prepares to take EU to court over Russia sanctions (Financial Times)