Parliamentary elections in Armenia on June 7 are likely to be the most important vote in the South Caucasus country since the Velvet Revolution of 2018. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has effectively turned it into a referendum: Vote for his Civil Contract party and the painful decisions required for peace, or the pro-Russian opposition and risk a new war. Although the opposition tends to agree with Pashinyan that it’s a referendum, it would put the choice differently: capitulation versus preserving Armenia’s national dignity.  

Azerbaijan and Armenia are currently normalizing relations following three decades of confrontation and several wars—and Azerbaijan has not hidden its interest in the twists and turns of its neighbor’s election campaign. But Azerbaijan’s position remains ambiguous. Some of Baku’s actions strengthen the position of Pashinyan’s supporters, while others play into the hands of his opponents.

On the surface, Azerbaijan has every reason to want to see Pashinyan re-elected. After all, it was under Pashinyan that Armenia recognized Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, gave up on Armenian claims to Nagorno-Karabakh, and abandoned the narrative of returning the Armenians expelled by Baku from the formerly disputed region—all for the sake of progress in peace talks with Azerbaijan. To improve ties with Azerbaijan’s major regional backer, Türkiye, Pashinyan has advocated abandoning traditional Armenian symbols like Mount Ararat, and giving up on efforts to persuade the international community to recognize the Armenian genocide of 1915.

Pashinyan believes Armenians have no choice but to make compromises and concessions if they want to make peace and reopen the country’s international borders with Azerbaijan and Türkiye. Yerevan has even begun preparations for the constitutional referendum that is one of Baku’s conditions for peace.  

Pashinyan’s policies have already produced tangible results. The trade between Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey is being resumed, while Washington has brokered an agreement for what would be the first trade transit route through the three countries for decades: the so-called Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) that would pass through southern Armenia. 

There are also significant advantages for Baku in continuing the normalization of relations with Yerevan. Azerbaijan’s economy has been stagnating, and oil export revenue is unpredictable. Being able to present itself as the architect of a regional reconciliation and a new transit corridor would give Baku access to new money flows, a new source of legitimacy, and a new argument in its ongoing dialogue with the West.

Pashinyan is a key element of such a future for Azerbaijan. He has proved his ability to negotiate, his consistency, and his willingness to take political risks by explaining the necessity of concessions to the Armenian public. There is no other similar figure in Armenian politics.

It’s unsurprising, therefore, that Baku regularly signals that an opposition victory in Armenia’s elections could mean the collapse of peace negotiations, and further conflict. “We know that there are enough groups in Armenian politics that live with hatred toward the Azerbaijani people and state, and if they come to power, the Armenian people will have a lot of problems,” President Ilham Aliyev said in April. Other Azerbaijani officials have made comments along similar lines.  

State-owned media outlets in Azerbaijan have been even more direct, with articles that warn of the dangers of Armenia’s “party of war” coming to power and describe Pashinyan’s successes. The latter stand out in particular because until very recently, Pashinyan was nothing less than a hate figure for Azerbaijani media.

Still, Azerbaijan’s position is not that simple. Despite all the conversations about striving for peace in the region, Baku has not made any concessions—even symbolic ones—that would help Pashinyan justify himself to Armenians. While Azerbaijan has started selling fuel and some other goods to Armenia, it has also continued tearing down Armenian churches in Nagorno-Karabakh, which is bad timing for Pashinyan. Baku also reacted angrily to European Parliament resolutions criticizing Azerbaijan’s treatment of the former leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Nor has Baku given up on the concept of “western Azerbaijan”—a term used by the Azerbaijani authorities to refer to modern Armenia, which implies it is rightfully Azerbaijani territory. In recent months, a state university in Azerbaijan has opened a department for the study of “the economic potential of western Azerbaijan,” and there have been discussions about setting up a football team called Western Azerbaijan. While this sort of official rhetoric is not as strident as it once was, it has not disappeared.

In Armenia, all of this is seen as evidence that Azerbaijan’s territorial ambitions did not end with the seizure of Nagorno-Karabakh in 2023. It plays directly into the hands of Armenia’s pro-Russian opposition: If the pressure from Baku continues despite all Yerevan’s concessions, they argue, it means Pashinyan’s strategy isn’t working. Such arguments have been made repeatedly by the opposition. “Either you come to vote, or the Azerbaijanis will come” is a slogan used by Samvel Karapetyan, leader of the Strong Armenia party, in one of his election campaign videos.

In other words, Azerbaijan is pouring fuel on the arguments made by both Pashinyan’s supporters and his opponents. This might seem illogical and contradictory, but Baku’s ultimate goal is not just to ensure Pashinyan is re-elected, but that he is re-elected with a weaker mandate.

When Pashinyan conducts peace negotiations, discusses changes to the Armenian constitution, and negotiates transit routes across Armenian territory, Baku wants him to be politically vulnerable, caught between fears of a new war and accusations of capitulation. Such an electoral outcome would make the Armenian leader more dependent on external sources of legitimacy, and, as a result, easier for Azerbaijan to manage. This logic is entirely in keeping with the broader strategy of the Azerbaijani authorities: peace with Armenia—on the victor’s terms.