President Donald Trump hosted Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev at the White House on 8 August to sign a declaration aimed at ending more than three decades of conflict. A centrepiece of the accord is the 32-kilometre “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity”, also known as the Zangezur Corridor, which would give Azerbaijan overland access to its Nakhchivan exclave and grant the United States exclusive development rights to the route. Tehran immediately condemned the project. Ali Akbar Velayati, senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, warned on 9 August that Iran would block the corridor “with or without Russia”, calling it a threat to Armenia’s territorial integrity and vowing it would become “a graveyard for Trump’s mercenaries”. While Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian later told Mr Pashinyan he welcomed peace, he also cautioned against any foreign military presence near Iran’s border. Iran’s opposition clouds implementation of the U.S.-brokered deal, which already faces logistical hurdles over customs and security arrangements. Analysts say it is unclear how Iran could physically obstruct the route, but the dispute underscores shifting power dynamics in the South Caucasus as Washington seeks a larger role and Moscow is pre-occupied elsewhere. Tehran’s pushback has extended to Lebanon, where the government has endorsed a U.S.-supported plan to place all weapons under state control. Hezbollah lawmaker Mohammed Raad dismissed the move as “suicide”, and Mr Velayati said disarming the Iran-backed group “will never come true”. Lebanon’s army and President Joseph Aoun insist only state security forces should bear arms, highlighting a growing internal confrontation over Hezbollah’s arsenal. Against this backdrop, Iran’s top security official Ali Larijani travelled to Baghdad on 11 August to sign a draft security memorandum with Iraq and then flew to Beirut for talks with Lebanese leaders. Mr Aoun told him Lebanon rejects external interference, while Mr Larijani said Iran respects Lebanese sovereignty but stands ready to assist “if the government requests it”, signalling Tehran’s determination to safeguard its regional alliances as U.S. initiatives gain ground.