According to the Armenian Government Decision of September 11, 2025, the image of Mount Ararat will be removed from Armenia’s passport entry and exit stamps starting November 1, 2025.
This decision was officially published on ARLIS, the Armenian Legal Information System, the government’s official platform for publishing laws and legal documents.
The original decision, Government Decision No. 702-N of May 12, 2011, defined the regime of Armenia’s state border, including the forms and design of border markers, rules for border maintenance, and the procedure for crossing by persons, vehicles, and cargo. That 2011 regulation also introduced the official format of Armenia’s passport stamps, which until now included Mount Ararat as a key visual element.
The new amendments introduce several changes:
- Terminology update: The words “border sign” have been officially replaced with “border marker” throughout the legal text.
- Technical revisions: In Annex No. 1, the description of materials for border markers was updated, while in Annex No. 2, additional requirements were introduced for the operation of border infrastructure.
- Stamp design change: Annex No. 3 revises the official passport stamp format. The size has been reduced from 42 x 25 mm to 38 x 24 mm, and the description of the stamp’s content has been redrafted. The new version specifies that the stamp will display the words “????????” and “ARMENIA,” the name of the border crossing point, the date, the entry/exit mark, and relevant symbols for air, railway, or automobile checkpoints.
- Notably, the image of Mount Ararat, previously featured on Armenia’s border stamps, has been removed.
Observers note that this symbolic change comes at a time when normalization talks between Armenia and Turkey have become more active, including recent meetings between the special envoys Serdar K?l?ç and Ruben Rubinyan on Friday. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has repeatedly emphasized Mount Aragats, located within Armenia’s borders, as the country’s highest peak, signaling a rhetorical and symbolic shift away from Mount Ararat amid evolving geopolitical realities.
At a press conference in May 2023, he stated: “If children call Ararat, and not Aragats, the highest mountain of Armenia, does this mean that Armenia has territorial claims against Türkiye?”
He then added: “On the contrary, they must do everything to destroy us. And now I ask the question: what is the highest mountain in Armenia? The answer is Aragats.”
In the months that followed, Pashinyan reinforced this message visually, posting images of Mount Aragats on his official social media channels and using it as the backdrop during public press briefings. The deliberate symbolism was widely interpreted as a recalibration of how Armenia’s leadership presents national identity, one that avoids any implication of territorial claims toward Turkey.
