By Nailia Bagirova and Lucy Papachristou
BAKU, Feb 10 (Reuters) - The United States and Azerbaijan signed a strategic partnership in Baku on Tuesday encompassing economic and security cooperation as Washington seeks to expand its influence in a region where Russia was once the main power broker.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev inked the agreement with U.S. Vice President JD Vance, visiting Azerbaijan after travelling to its neighbour and longtime foe Armenia.
Aliyev said Baku and Washington were
entering "an entirely new phase" in cooperation on defence sales and artificial intelligence, and would continue collaboration in energy security and counter-terrorism.
US SEEKS TO SUPPORT ENERGY ACCESS IN SOUTH CAUCASUS
Vance said the U.S. would send Azerbaijan an undisclosed number of ships to help it protect its territorial waters.
The charter was first presented at talks between Aliyev and President Donald Trump in Washington in August, where Aliyev reached a peace agreement with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to end decades of war.
During his visit to Armenia this week, Vance signed a deal with Pashinyan that could pave the way for the U.S. to build a nuclear power plant in a country long dependent on imports of Russian and Iranian energy.
On his tour, Vance has also sought to advance the "Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP)", a proposed 43-km (27-mile) corridor that would cut across Armenia and give Azerbaijan direct access to its exclave of Nakhchivan and to its close ally Turkey.
The route would better connect Asia to Europe at a time when Washington wants to diversify energy and trade flows away from Russia due to its war in Ukraine.
"Our hope is that (TRIPP) will help build economic cooperation, cooperation on natural resources and critical minerals, and make it possible for this incredible peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia to truly endure," Vance said at a press conference with Aliyev.
Azerbaijan is keen to showcase its potential as a reliable partner for the U.S. in the region, said Rauf Mammadov, an energy policy scholar at the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington-based think-tank.
"In terms of the hierarchy of priorities, Azerbaijan positioning itself as... a Western-oriented island of stability between Russia and Iran is important," he said.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have made steps towards putting their nearly 40-year-old conflict to rest since meeting with Trump last year. No formal peace deal has been signed, however, although they have restarted some energy shipments.
(Reporting by Nailia Bagirova in Baku and Lucy Papachristou in Tbilisi; Writing by Lucy Papachristou; editing by Mark Trevelyan and Kevin Liffey)
