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Conflict coverage · South Caucasus

The Caucasus: Unresolved Wars and Regional Power

Unresolved wars inside a changing regional system.

Regional systemStatus: PublishedConflict reviewed 2026-08-30Assessed as of 2026-07

Contains:CorridorEnergyDe facto stateDisplacementRegional power

Where this conflict stands

Armenia–Azerbaijan, Georgia's breakaway regions, Chechnya, and the corridors reshaping Russia's southern frontier. The Caucasus is not one war: it is a linked regional security system in which unresolved conflicts, de facto states, Soviet-drawn borders, displacement, energy routes and the competing interests of Russia, Türkiye, Iran and the West all act on each other — and in which Russia's absorption in Ukraine has set the whole system moving at once.

Feb 1988
Karabakh conflict re-ignites
As of 1988-02highEstablished historical record
100,000+
Karabakh Armenians displaced to Armenia (2023)
As of 2023-10highUNHCR data and reporting (South Caucasus)
~290,000
Registered IDPs in Georgia (est.)
As of 2024moderateUNHCR data and reporting (South Caucasus)
1.2M b/d
BTC pipeline design capacity
As of 2024highbp Azerbaijan pipeline and project disclosures

Changed in brief2026-08-23 · Status wording updated

Backgroundwhy this matters, and the conflict in 6 points

Why it matters

This is where three empires' borders were drawn and redrawn, and the seams are still load-bearing. A war ended here in 2023 after thirty-five years, a peace text was agreed in 2025, and neither event resolved the questions underneath — what the borders are, who guarantees them, and which roads and railways may cross them. It also matters to people with no stake in the region's politics: the corridors running through it carry Caspian energy to Europe and a growing share of the overland trade between China and the EU, on routes chosen specifically to avoid Russia and Iran. The Caucasus is small, and what happens to its transit geography is not.

The conflict in five minutes

6 points, composed from this conflict’s own sourced records — nothing here is a new claim.

This is several disputes, not one

Three separate files sit in this module and they do not resolve together: Armenia and Azerbaijan over Karabakh and their border; Georgia over Abkhazia and South Ossetia; and the North Caucasus inside Russia. They share a region, a set of external powers and a history — not a settlement, a timetable or a set of participants.

The Karabakh conflict ended, and its consequences did not

Azerbaijan recovered the territory in the 2020 war and took the remainder in a one-day operation in September 2023. Almost the entire Armenian population left within days, and the de facto entity dissolved. The fighting is over; return, property, heritage and the missing are not.

A peace text exists and has not been signed into force

Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed the text of a peace treaty in March 2025; their foreign ministers initialled it in Washington in August 2025 and their leaders signed a separate declaration the same day. It is still not signed. Azerbaijan conditions signature on an Armenian constitutional amendment, which requires a referendum slated for 2027. This module treats an agreed text and a concluded peace as different things.

Georgia's status question is frozen; its administration is not

Russia recognised Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent after the 2008 war; almost no other state has, and Georgia's territorial claim is unchanged. But calling the file static is wrong: in May 2026 Russia and the South Ossetian de facto authorities signed a treaty merging economic space and opening the entity's offices to Russian citizens, while Abkhazia rejected lesser terms and lost its electricity and budget support until its leadership changed. Nothing has moved on status and a great deal has moved underneath it.

Russia lost its monopoly without leaving

Russian peacekeepers left Karabakh in 2024, Armenia froze its participation in the Russian-led security bloc, Russian border guards have left every Armenian border checkpoint, and Türkiye, the EU and the United States have gained ground. Moscow's base at Gyumri remains on a lease running to 2044, its integration of the two Georgian entities has deepened, and its economic levers are intact. The right reading is lost arbitration, not absence — and nothing has yet replaced the role Russia played between Yerevan and Baku.

The corridors are the region's other subject

Oil and gas pipelines and the rail and road links of the Middle Corridor cross this region because they can avoid Russia and Iran. Which routes open, on whose terms and under whose control is now as central to the diplomacy as territory is — and several proposed routes do not yet exist.

Everything in this module

13 analytical layers, each a full record with its own sources, dates and confidence.

Understand

How did this get here, and who is in it?

  • History12The phases that produced the present situation, each graded and sourced — the long arc a dated timeline cannot show.
  • Key Events48The dated turning points, filterable by the 4 arenas this conflict runs across.
  • Profiles13What each actor is trying to do, what constrains it, and where its stated position differs from Vigil’s assessment.

Military & security

Who can do what, where, and how is it sustained?

  • Force Atlas16How the forces on each side are organised — formations, lineage and subordination, never locations or strength.
  • Campaigns3The sustained efforts each side is actually running, with what each is for and how far it has got.
  • Terrain context3Why the ground itself constrains the fighting — rivers, approaches and corridors that decide what is possible.
  • Strategic logistics4Import corridors, ports, crossings and hubs — the supply systems both sides depend on, and the nodes that would break them.
  • Equipment6Family-level records of the systems in use here — what each is for, never quantities or readiness.

Effects & resilience

What is this doing to economies and to people?

  • EconomyCommodities, sanctions architecture and trade chokepoints — how the war transmits into prices and budgets.
  • HumanitarianDisplacement, protection and civilian infrastructure conditions, at regional level and never operational.
  • Impact chains4Step-by-step mechanisms from a trigger to an effect, each step graded so you can see where evidence ends.

Follow

What is changing, and how do I work with it?

  • Weekly Briefs7Every dated review of this conflict, including the weeks that found nothing and say so.
  • Explore7The same records, made selectable — choose a country, an actor or a relationship and follow the structure around it.

Latest

The newest published work on this conflict. Conflict reviewed 2026-08-30.

Weekly Brief2026-08-30

Caucasus developments — 30 August 2026

2 developments · 9 watch items reviewed2026-08-24 → 2026-08-30

Armenia spent the week doing two things at once, and neither concerned Azerbaijan. Its Anti-Corruption Committee detained second president Robert Kocharyan on 25 August and had him remanded for two months, indicted his son and nine others including third president Serzh Sargsyan, and barred Sargsyan from leaving the country; on 28 August the head of the Armenian Apostolic Church appeared in court. In the same days Pashinyan said he would be glad if Armenia were expelled from the CSTO and that Yerevan would soon begin formally applying for EU membership, and Moscow answered that the West is blackmailing Armenia. The peace file itself moved only technically, at an electricity meeting in Lachin.

Read the brief Every dated review

Theatre map

Interactive · approximate · as of 2026-07

Status and context zones
Loading map…
Interactive map — tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors, © CARTO. Markers show broad, publicly documented locations; sensitive sites are generalized to area level. Zone fills, where shown, are broad and approximate context with their own dates and confidence — never precise boundaries. The map does not show current deployments, activity or operational readiness, and is not suitable for operational use. Status is dated and contextual — see themethodology.
Status and context zones: broad · approximate · as of 2026-08 · Confidence: graded per zone
Zone legend — Status and context zones

Caucasus zones show de facto administration, historical conflict areas and broad corridor bands. They are status descriptions, not recognition claims, and never depict current military positions or an active front line.

  • Abkhazia — de facto administered — De facto administered; recognised internationally as part of Georgia. As of 2026-06 · Confidence: High.
  • South Ossetia / Tskhinvali region — de facto administered — De facto administered; recognised internationally as part of Georgia. As of 2026-08 · Confidence: High.
  • Nagorno-Karabakh — historical conflict zone — Former Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone — under Azerbaijani control since 2023; Armenian population displaced. As of 2026-06 · Confidence: High.
  • North Caucasus — historical war & insurgency zone — Historical war and insurgency zone inside Russia — context, not an active front. As of 2026-06 · Confidence: High.
  • East–west corridor belt — Broad bands along energy and trade corridors — not routes or infrastructure maps. As of 2026-06 · Confidence: High.

Watch

9 questions Vigil is tracking on Caucasus — each one a file it is following, not a forecast it is making.

  1. Has the initialled peace agreement been signed?

    The text was agreed in March 2025 and initialled by the two foreign ministers at the White House on 8 August 2025. It is not signed, and this module treats agreed, initialled, signed, ratified and implemented as five different states. The remaining stated obstacle is Azerbaijan's condition that Armenia first amend its constitution; Armenia's drafting council is to produce a text by the end of 2026 for a referendum slated for 2027, so the near-term observables are the draft's publication and a referendum date, not the signature itself. The OSCE Minsk Group's dissolution, long carried as an outstanding precondition, is done.

    Operation record

  2. Has TRIPP moved from framework and survey into construction?

    The Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity has accumulated instruments faster than works: a Washington declaration in August 2025, an Armenia–US implementation framework in January 2026 widening the scope from road and rail to a multimodal programme, a signed framework agreement in May 2026, and engineering surveys in Armenia reported under way in 2026. A survey is the point at which an alignment stops being notional; it is not construction. Nothing has been built on Armenian territory. The milestones that would change the finding are a final alignment, a contracting or financing close, a construction start, and an agreed customs and border-control arrangement — in that order.

    Logistics records

  3. Is Armenia's realignment becoming institutional rather than declaratory?

    Four things are true at once and are routinely collapsed into one. Armenia remains a de jure member of the CSTO; it has frozen participation since 2024 and has not paid contributions for a third consecutive year, which under Article 25 of the charter can cost it quota posts and voting rights. Russian border guards have left every Armenian border checkpoint — Zvartnots in 2024, the Iranian crossing from January 2025, Margara from March 2025, Akhurik from the start of 2026. The 102nd Military Base at Gyumri remains, on a lease running to 2044, and Armenia has not proposed changing that. And Armenia's Western ties are partnership and monitoring instruments, not security guarantees. Watch the CSTO's treatment of Armenia's standing, and whether any Western instrument acquires a defence commitment. Neither has happened.

    Actor profiles

  4. Is Russian integration of the two Georgian entities deepening?

    The status question is static and the administration is not. Russia and the de facto authorities in South Ossetia signed a Treaty on Deepening Allied Interaction on 9 May 2026, ratified by the Russian State Duma days later, providing for coordinated foreign, defence and security policy, a single economic space, staged integration of energy, transport and telecommunications, and the removal of citizenship restrictions on holding state and municipal office. Georgia calls it a step toward annexation; France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom state it has no validity in international law; the de facto president who signed it described it as a legal mechanism for future accession to Russia, then resigned in June 2026 into the Russian presidential administration. Abkhazia has resisted comparable terms and remains dependent on Russian energy and budget support. Watch which further instruments are concluded, and whether Abkhazia's resistance holds.

    Operation record
5 further entriesthe rest of the standing watch list

  • Has delimitation extended beyond the 2024 Tavush section?

    One section of border has been delimited since the mechanism was created: roughly a dozen kilometres in the Tavush direction in 2024, involving the transfer of four villages to Azerbaijani control. Delimitation is the agreement of a line on a map; demarcation is its marking on the ground, and the two are not interchangeable. The commissions have agreed the 1991 Alma-Ata Declaration and the Soviet-era maps in force at the time as the baseline. Watch which sections are taken up next and in what order — the Armenian-administered enclaves are the hardest of them, and one sits on Armenia's principal north–south road.

  • Has the Armenia–Türkiye border opened to any category of traveller?

    It has not. The land border has been closed since 1993. Armenia and Türkiye agreed in July 2022, and reaffirmed in 2025, to open it to third-country nationals and holders of diplomatic passports; the Margara crossing on the Armenian side has been reported ready since 2023, and Armenia says it is waiting on Turkish implementation. What has changed is adjacent rather than at the border: Armenia has allowed Azerbaijani lorries bound for Türkiye to transit its territory since late 2025. A first crossing by any category of traveller would be the marker; announcements about readiness have recurred for four years.

  • Are the unresolved human files moving, or hardening?

    The territorial question was closed by force in 2023. The consequences were not, and in 2026 one of them moved in the direction of closure against the displaced rather than toward settlement: a Baku court sentenced fifteen former Karabakh officials in February 2026, five to life imprisonment, with a separate twenty-year sentence for Ruben Vardanyan, and an appeal court upheld the verdicts in August 2026. Neither the initialled treaty nor the Washington declaration commits Azerbaijan to release anyone. The other files — some 4,500 missing recorded by the ICRC, property and return claims, mine clearance measured in decades — are unmoved. Watch any release, any return framework, and whether these files are named in the settlement at all.

  • Are the corridors carrying more, and is any of it new geography?

    The material test of whether the region's diplomacy produces connectivity. Middle Corridor volumes rose steeply after 2022 from a small base and are reported on differing bases in the 4.5–5.2 million tonne range for 2025, with container traffic around 77,000 TEU; the binding constraints are Caspian ferry capacity, port throughput and the Baku–Tbilisi–Kars line, not demand. Azerbaijani gas to the EU was about 12.8 bcm in 2025, essentially flat, against expansion commitments that depend on fields not yet producing. Watch whether growth continues, and separately whether any of it crosses a border that was closed — which is the only kind of increase the settlement would explain.

  • Does the Chechen succession question produce an observable event?

    The module covers the North Caucasus as a Russian interior security system and holds it at structural level: Chechnya's stability is an arrangement with one man, the succession question is discussed openly, and Dagestan has produced the region's worst recent attacks. Vigil publishes no incident counter here and makes no prediction. The observable is a formal change in the Chechen leadership or its designated succession, which is the only development that would require this module to reassess the arrangement rather than describe it.

Key actors

The 5 actors a first-time reader cannot follow Caucasus without, marked as such on the records themselves. All 13 carry a full profile with objectives, constraints, leverage and stated red lines.

  • Armenia

    ArmeniaState · repositioning

    A small state carrying the region's heaviest losses — the 2020 defeat, the 2023 fall of Karabakh, and the absorption of its displaced population — now betting its future on a peace it has initialled but not signed, and on a westward turn its geography makes expensive.

  • Azerbaijan

    Azerbaijan & partnersState · regional ascendant

    The region's military and energy ascendant: victor of 2020, holder of all of Karabakh since 2023, supplier Europe courts, Türkiye's closest partner — and a state that paces the peace process through preconditions because time, for now, works in its favour.

  • Georgia

    GeorgiaState · contested direction

    The region's transit state and its sharpest political contest: a country whose EU membership is written into its constitution and polled around 85% support, governed by a party that froze accession — with a fifth of its recognised territory under de facto separatist administration and Russian protection.

  • Russia in the Caucasus

    Russia & aligned structuresDeclining regional arbiter

    The former metropole and ceasefire-broker of every Caucasus conflict — now a power stretched by Ukraine, whose Karabakh peacekeepers left early, whose Armenian ally froze their alliance, and whose remaining strength runs through garrisons, treaties of absorption, energy, trade and the North Caucasus interior.

  • Türkiye in the Caucasus

    External · Azerbaijan-alignedExternal power · Azerbaijan's partner

    Baku's military and political backer — decisive in 2020, formalised by the 2021 Shusha Declaration — and the terminus of every westbound corridor: for Ankara the Caucasus is the land bridge of its Turkic-world policy and a theatre where it has displaced Russian primacy without firing a shot.

All 13 Caucasus profiles

Open this conflict in Explore

Explore is the interactive half of Vigil: select a country, an actor or a relationship in Caucasus and follow what connects to it. Choose the job you came to do — it sets where Explore opens, never what Vigil claims to be true.

7 of 7 views have every part of their content in place for Caucasus. That describes what a view is assembled from — not how certain any claim in it is. Each record carries its own confidence grade, as-of date and stated gaps.

Evidence and review status

Conflict reviewed
2026-08-30— the date of this conflict’s most recent verified Weekly Brief. It records a review of the conflict as a whole, not a revalidation of every underlying record; each record carries its own date.
Assessed as of
2026-07 — the date this conflict’s standing geographic and situational claims are drawn to.
Review cadence
Weekly review / event-driven updates — quiet weeks are published as quiet reviews rather than as silence.

Scope of this coverage. This is regional-system coverage, not a single-conflict frame: it covers the Caucasus as a connected system across four sub-theatres, with a historical and structural focus. It does not track daily events, and it does not map current military positions anywhere.

Source registryMethodologyCorrections logGlossary

Found an error in Caucasus coverage? Corrections are logged in public with the date and what changed — see the corrections log.