Turkey's foreign ministry said Turkey and Armenia had completed preliminary work to resume full trade ties on May 13, adding that more work still needed to be accomplished on technical connections and bureaucratic requirements before full normalization could take place, Bianet reported the same day. The move lifted customs restrictions that previously made bilateral trade difficult.

Turkey and Armenia have remained in conflict over Armenia's international push for recognition of the 1916 Armenian genocide and Turkey's support for Azerbaijan. However, Azerbaijan's conquest of the Nagorno-Karabakh exclave in Armenia in 2023 and the removal of the Armenian population from there eased a key sticking point in the relationship, while Russian and U.S. mediation has helped improve ties since 2022.