Washington: Armenia and Azerbaijan have signed a peace agreement at the White House expected to bring decades of conflict to an end. Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan shook hands after signing the agreement on Friday, with US President Donald Trump, who brokered the deal, in the middle, clasping his hands around theirs.

According to Islamic Republic News Agency, as part of the deal, the US will help build a major transit corridor that will be named the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity. Trump said that naming the route after him was ‘a great honor for me,’ but ‘I didn’t ask for this.’

Trump expressed optimism about the lasting peace between the two nations, stating, ‘It’s been a long time coming. Thirty-five years they fought, and now they’re friends and they’re going to be friends a long time.’

Pashinyan described the agreement as a ‘significant milestone,’ adding, ‘We are laying a foundation to write a better story than the one we had in the past.’ Aliyev praised Trump’s efforts, stating, ‘President Trump in six months did a miracle.’

The two nations had been in conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region for nearly four decades until 2023, when Azerbaijan reclaimed all of Karabakh.