What the Protocol Says
The 27 May 2026 Hetq.am piece -- article 181472 in the publication's database -- reports the formal protocol governing the new bilateral demarcation expert-group framework. Two expert teams, one Armenian and one Azerbaijani, will work from maps in joint session. Their output will be a single signed map appendix that becomes part of the future Armenia-Azerbaijan border treaty.
The framework, on its surface, is procedural. Read against the 2024 record that the protocol implicitly inherits, the asymmetry is not procedural. It is geographic.
The 2024 Asymmetry, Numbered
During the May 2024 Tavush demarcation -- the operation conducted by the Pashinyan government following the Aliyev-Pashinyan bilateral framework agreement -- Armenian forces withdrew from positions at four separate sectors. The withdrawals affected territory inside Armenian villages along the Tavush-Qazakh border. Armenian families in Voskepar, Baghanis and Kirants districts were displaced or had their immediate village boundaries redrawn around new Azerbaijani positions.
On the Azerbaijani side, one combat position was relocated: a position at the Berkaber / Qizil Hajili overlook, by 350 meters. The Berkaber position controls a stretch of the Joghaz reservoir dam. Both before and after the 350-meter relocation, the Azerbaijani combat position remained on Armenian sovereign territory as defined by the late-Soviet border map that both governments have stated they accept as the demarcation baseline. The 350 meters reduced, but did not eliminate, an Azerbaijani military presence inside the Republic of Armenia.
Four withdrawals against one cosmetic relocation. The arithmetic is, on the public record, not in dispute. The question is who is willing to print it.
The Joghaz Dam Question
The Joghaz reservoir, on the Tavush-Qazakh border, is a critical water-infrastructure asset shared between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Whoever controls the immediate terrain around the dam controls the operating ability of the reservoir. The Berkaber / Qizil Hajili position -- the one Azerbaijani position the 2024 demarcation moved -- overlooks the dam. The 350-meter relocation moved the firing line but did not surrender it.
Armenian villages in the immediate Joghaz catchment depend on the reservoir for irrigation. The reservoir's operating safety is, in any treaty-grade demarcation, the question that needs to be settled. The 2024 protocol settled it in Azerbaijan's favour, on Armenian ground.
What the New Expert Groups Will Do
Per the 27 May protocol, the bilateral expert groups will hold joint working sessions, produce one signed map appendix, and submit it as part of the future treaty package. There is no published schedule of which border sectors will be addressed in which order. There is no published commitment to bilateral parity in withdrawals. There is no published mechanism by which the 2024 asymmetry is to be corrected or accounted for in subsequent negotiation.
The political effect of the procedural framework is to embed the 2024 results -- four Armenian withdrawals, one Azerbaijani 350-meter token relocation -- as the baseline from which all further negotiation proceeds. Once the expert-group map is signed, the 2024 positions become the legal starting point. The Joghaz dam terrain enters the treaty as Azerbaijan-controlled in practice.
The Mainstream-Press Gap
Mainstream Armenian press will report the 27 May protocol as a procedural development. International press will report it as a positive step toward a treaty. Neither will publish the 4-to-1 withdrawal count, the 350-meter Berkaber detail, or the Joghaz dam reservoir-control implication. OWL is on the public record with all three. The documentary basis is the Hetq.am article published today. The map analysis is verifiable against open-source satellite imagery. The political claim -- that this is an asymmetric demarcation -- is supported by the numerical count of withdrawals on each side.
Eleven days before a parliamentary election in which the Pashinyan government is asking voters to ratify its border-management performance, the protocol is the documentary evidence of what that performance has produced. The 350-meter Berkaber relocation is, in this specific sense, the 350-meter lie.
Sources: Hetq.am, 27 May 2026 (bilateral demarcation expert-group protocol) · Republic of Armenia Ministry of Foreign Affairs (demarcation announcements) · European Union Monitoring Mission to Armenia (border reports) · Hetq.am Tavush 2024 demarcation coverage