Starting today Armenia ready to allow Turkey-Azerbaijan truck transit: Highlights from Pashinyan’s speech

Nikol Pashinyan presented the draft 2026 budget in the National Assembly. Below are highlights from his speech:

• This is the first time that we are discussing the RA budget under conditions of peace with Azerbaijan.
• Azerbaijan’s announcement removing transit restrictions to Armenia is, in essence, a historic event and marks the first phase in overcoming Armenia’s blockade.
• Starting today, we are ready to facilitate the transit of trucks from Turkey to Azerbaijan and from Azerbaijan to Turkey, specifically along the Margara–Yeghegnadzor–Sisian–Goris route. This is the only option we can implement immediately.
• We are rapidly developing our armed forces, and we are also developing the concept on which our armed forces are based.
• We assert that our army has no mission to operate outside the internationally recognized sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia.
• It is important that in our everyday working dialogue we transform the concept of a combat-ready army into a defense-ready army, because the term combat-ready does not specify where potential combat might occur or could occur.