Trump Urged to Press Azerbaijan to Release 19 Armenian Prisoners

President Donald Trump should use Washington’s growing influence in the South Caucasus to push Azerbaijan to release 19 Armenian prisoners still held in Baku, foreign policy analyst Darren G. Spinck argues, calling their continued detention a major unresolved test of the U.S.-backed Armenia-Azerbaijan peace process.

Spinck, managing director of Janus Forum and a non-resident fellow at the Danube Institute, made the case in an opinion column published by The Washington Times. His appeal comes as Armenia enters a new political term following Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s victory in the June 7 parliamentary elections.

The election result gives Pashinyan a renewed mandate as his government moves ahead with a peace agenda that has increasingly drawn the United States into efforts to reshape political and economic ties across the South Caucasus.

At the center of that effort is the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, known as TRIPP, which emerged from the agreements reached by Armenia, Azerbaijan and the United States at the White House in August 2025.

The project is designed to establish a transit connection through Armenia between mainland Azerbaijan and Nakhijevan. The route would operate under Armenian sovereignty and jurisdiction and is expected to carry transportation and other infrastructure across southern Armenia.

Supporters see TRIPP as a chance to turn Armenia’s geography into an economic advantage, opening new trade links between the Caspian region and Europe while attracting investment and lowering transportation costs.

Spinck argues that the project could also deepen U.S. involvement in a region where Russia has historically held significant influence, without requiring an American military presence or long-term financial assistance.

But he says the success of the broader peace effort cannot be measured by infrastructure projects and economic agreements alone.

For many Armenians, the 19 prisoners held in Azerbaijan remain one of the most painful unresolved consequences of the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh. Spinck argues that their release would send a tangible signal that reconciliation is extending beyond borders and trade.

The detainees include former political and military leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh who were taken into Azerbaijani custody following Baku’s occupation of the region. Several have since received lengthy prison sentences in proceedings criticized by human rights advocates.

Azerbaijan says the detainees committed serious crimes. Armenian officials, lawyers and advocates have repeatedly sought their release and raised concerns over the legal proceedings against them.

Their detention followed the final collapse of indigenous Armenian control over Nagorno-Karabakh in September 2023, when Azerbaijan launched a military offensive and took full control of the region. Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan but had been overwhelmingly populated by ethnic Armenians. Nearly the entire Armenian population fled to Armenia after the offensive.

Spinck argues that resolving the prisoner issue would not require Washington to reopen the territorial dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh. Instead, he says Trump can continue backing normalization between Yerevan and Baku while pressing Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev for the prisoners’ release as a humanitarian measure.

The issue has also been raised by officials and lawmakers in Europe and North America, who have called on Azerbaijan to free Armenian detainees and described their release as a step that could help build confidence in the peace process.

Spinck says such a move could have particular importance as Pashinyan asks Armenians to accept reconciliation with Azerbaijan while pursuing closer political and economic ties with the United States and Europe.

It could also affect how the emerging agreement is viewed by Armenian communities abroad, including the large Armenian American population, which has repeatedly pressed Washington to address the prisoners’ fate.

With Trump personally associated with the U.S.-brokered framework, Spinck argues that the president now has both an opportunity and leverage to seek a humanitarian breakthrough from Baku.

TRIPP may help open borders and create new commercial links across the South Caucasus, he writes, but the return of the Armenian prisoners would give the peace process something infrastructure alone cannot provide: a measure of trust among people still living with the consequences of the conflict.

For Spinck, securing both would strengthen the chances that the Washington-backed agreement produces more than new transportation routes — and becomes the foundation for a peace Armenians and Azerbaijanis can believe will last.

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