Standing assessment
Current condition
High confidenceAs of
One section has been delimited since the mechanism was created: roughly a dozen kilometres in the Tavush direction in 2024, with four villages transferred to Azerbaijani control.
The commissions have agreed the 1991 Alma-Ata Declaration and the Soviet-era maps in force at the time as the baseline. The Armenian-administered enclaves are the hardest sections and one sits on Armenia's principal north–south road; no further section has been taken up.
Latest reviewBaseline
Opened on the 23 August finding that the enclaves — the hardest sections, one on Armenia's principal north–south road — are the next test of the mechanism.
Why it matters
Delimitation is the agreement of a line on a map; demarcation is its marking on the ground, and the two are not interchangeable. The border is where the settlement becomes physical before the treaty is signed — every transferred village, every marker and every closed road is a fact on the ground that the text either ratifies or ignores — and the enclaves are where the arithmetic of the 1991 baseline meets a road Armenia cannot do without.
Observables4 named · “met” describes evidence, not success
01Test
The next section taken up by the commissions
A commission communiqué naming a section, in whatever order. Order is the finding.
02Test
An arrangement for the Armenian-administered enclaves
Transfer, exchange, corridor or deferral — and what happens to the north–south road through one of them.
03Test
Marker placement or movement on the ground
Demarcation as distinct from delimitation: markers placed, moved or removed on any section, reported by either border service.
04Test
A departure from the 1991 Alma-Ata baseline
Either commission proposing a line that the Soviet-era maps do not support, which changes the rule rather than the section.
What would change the assessment2 thresholds · the boundaries as the record states them, none with a number
A second section delimited by commission communiqué, or an enclaves arrangement published
Would meanmoves the process from a single precedent to a practice.
Marker movement on a section not delimited
Would meanshows the ground moving ahead of the map.
What remains unknown
- The commissions publish communiqués rather than maps; which sections are under discussion is inferred from statements.
- The road question through the enclave is discussed publicly by Armenian officials and not by the commissions.
Readings the evidence also supports
- Delimitation waits on the treaty rather than preceding it, in which case the next section moves only after signature and this question is downstream of the treaty question.
Listed because the record's own assessment is not the only one its sources permit — not as a hedge on the assessment above.
Review ledger1 entry · opened · newest first, each tied to the review that made it
Baseline
Opened on the 23 August finding that the enclaves — the hardest sections, one on Armenia's principal north–south road — are the next test of the mechanism.
Brief item Armenia's government states what its own agreed method implies for the enclavesEvent Pashinyan applies the Alma-Ata baseline to the enclaves, and Armenian politics reactsReviewed in 2026-08-23
Connected system20 canonical records this question runs through · Watch owns the edge; each record shows the question back
Parties and forces 8
Actors
Means and systems 2
Campaigns
Ground 3
Arrangements and events 4
Vigil analysis 3
Profile
Weekly Briefs that reviewed it1 review
Weekly Briefs 1
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Assessed as of — 2026-08-23 Last reviewed — 2026-08-23