Armenia’s new draft constitution has yet to be published, but it has already become the country’s most heated political debate. In statements made in October, Pashinyan announced that the draft would soon be made public and that other scenarios, including early elections, were on the table if the opposition could not be persuaded.
Aliyev’s foreign policy adviser, Hikmet Hajiyev, had previously said that they were waiting for “just one final step” towards peace: a change to Armenia’s Constitution. The final step Hajiyev referred to concerns not an article of the constitution but a single sentence in its preamble. The sentence states that the Armenian people adopted the constitution “based on the fundamental principles of Armenian statehood and the national aspirations enshrined in the Declaration of Independence of Armenia.” The preamble to the Declaration, dated 23 August 1990, refers to the goals of “realizing the aspirations of all Armenians” and “restoring historical justice.” The most contentious reference, however, is this:
“Based on the joint decision of the Supreme Soviet of the Armenian SSR and the National Council of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) of 1 December 1989, ‘On the Reunification of the Armenian SSR and Nagorno-Karabakh’…”
In addition, Article 11 of the Declaration also supports efforts to secure international recognition of the Armenian Genocide committed in Ottoman Turkey and Western Armenia in 1915.
At the heart of Baku’s objection, however, is the 1989 decision on which the Declaration is based. That decision did not merely call for reunification; it declared that reunification had been realized and envisaged the integration of citizenship rights and institutions. In 1990, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR found this decision unenforceable and in contrast to the Soviet Constitution.
The decision itself can be traced back to February 20, 1988, when the People’s Deputies of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) asked the Supreme Soviets of the Azerbaijan SSR and the Armenian SSR to transfer the region from Azerbaijan to Armenia, and the Supreme Soviet of the USSR to take steps to that end.
Azerbaijan has objected ever since to this chain linking the 1988 request to the 1989 decision, then to Armenia’s Declaration of Independence and ultimately to its constitution. In a letter to the UN in 1994, it described the Declaration’s reliance on the 1989 decision as “direct evidence of continuity” between the two documents. Following the 44-day war in 2020 and ethnic cleansing of the Karabakh Armenians from the region in 2023, this objection became a precondition for peace.
Does the constitution have to change?
Yerevan, citing the Constitutional Court, maintains that the constitution contains no such territorial claim. On September 26, 2024, when the Court found the regulations governing the two countries’ border delimitation commissions constitutional, the Court stated that the reference in the preamble did not confer constitutional force on objectives not contained in the constitution itself. It did not, however, rule on the present independent legal status of the 1989 decision. Although Article 203 of the Constitution does not explicitly list the preamble, the Court’s interpretation places it under the same protection as the unamendable provisions. Aliyev sees the change as a safeguard against future Armenian governments. In short, Baku wants to trust the text, not its interpretation.
Pashinyan, meanwhile, arrives at the same point for different reasons. In March, he said the Declaration was “built on the logic of conflict,” and last week he called it “an anti-state text.” The ruling party has also confirmed that the new draft constitution will contain no reference to the Declaration. The government maintains that this is not a response to Baku’s demand, but a domestic agenda pursued since 2020.
Is signing technically possible?
In the first two articles of the 17-article agreement initialed in Washington in August 2025, the parties confirm that they have no territorial claims against each other and will have none in the future. Article 12 provides that domestic law cannot be invoked as grounds for failing to implement the agreement, while Article 16 makes its entry into force conditional on domestic ratification procedures. Yet the text has been awaiting signature for more than a year.
Under Armenian law, too, a signed agreement is reviewed by the Constitutional Court before ratification. Pashinyan has repeatedly said that, if the Court finds the agreement unconstitutional, he will initiate an amendment. In other words, if the parties reach a political understanding, the agreement can be signed today, and any constitutional issue can be resolved at the ratification stage. Baku’s refusal to accept this route shows that the obstacle is political, not technical.
Pashinyan’s three scenarios
As long as Baku keeps this door closed, Pashinyan’s options are constrained by parliamentary arithmetic. A decision to hold a referendum requires 70 votes in the 105-seat parliament, while Civil Contract holds 64 seats. Strong Armenia and the Armenia Alliance, meanwhile, regard the change as an imposition by Baku and say they will not support a referendum.
For now, the government is trying the way of persuasion. During a parliamentary session, Foreign Minister Mirzoyan asked the opposition directly: “If we receive confirmation that this is the final step before the peace agreement, will you join us?” If persuasion fails, Pashinyan has raised public pressure on the opposition as a second option. The last option is an early election. Pashinyan, however, warned that he was certain the opposition parties currently represented in parliament would not be re-elected in an early election, presumably because of the changes made to the electoral code after the last election. More recently, he said the prospect of an early election had diminished and that he was considering an offer the opposition that they could not refuse.
All these scenarios share a common sticking point: a guarantee that Yerevan cannot provide on its own. Pashinyan acknowledged that the answer to whether the constitutional change is Baku’s final precondition lies outside Armenia’s control. He also said that a new constitution would not automatically bring signature and ratification of the agreement. Although he suggested that the agreement might be signed in 2027–2028, Yerevan maintains that it is ready to sign sooner.
Where is the key to the deadlock?
This exposes a contradiction on both sides. Yerevan regards the constitution as a domestic matter, yet the referendum will effectively become a vote on peace. Baku says it is not interfering, yet it makes its signature conditional on that vote. According to Pashinyan, the Azerbaijani side also considers the constitution Armenia’s internal affair and says it is merely “informing” Yerevan. At this point, however, even as Pashinyan presents the constitutional change as a sovereign choice, he is seeking political guarantees from Baku to make that choice possible.
There are two ways out of this impasse: complete the Washington process, witnessed by the United States, with a written commitment that constitutional change is the “final condition” or sign the agreement now and leave ratification until after the constitutional debate. The second option would not mean Aliyev abandoning his demand. It would simply separate signing from ratification. Armenian voters could then cast their ballots not on an imposition, but on a tangible peace.
Ultimately, changing a sentence that is more than thirty years old first requires reducing more than thirty years of mistrust. Ironically, as stronger guarantees are sought to make peace “irreversible,” the signing of the very agreement that could itself form part of those guarantees continues to be postponed.
