This is one of the collateral effects of the war between Ukraine and Russia, which worries the countries of the region. Faced with the threat of floating mines likely to drift into the Black Sea from Russian or Ukrainian shores, Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania, three NATO members bordering this highly strategic sea, joined forces this Thursday, January 11 to protect international shipping and their coasts.
The Black Sea Mine Action Initiative (also called MCM Black Sea), signed in Istanbul, should make it possible to secure Ukrainian grain exports along the Romanian and Bulgarian coasts, an alternative navigation route put in place after the end of the grain corridor denounced by Russia in the summer of 2023. Foreshadowing of this alliance , a Naval Mine Action Group in the Black Sea had already been created by Turkey in August 2023 after Moscow refused to extend the grain agreement launched a year earlier under the aegis of the United Nations.
No interventions from other NATO countries
Romanian Defense Minister Angel Tilvar and Bulgarian Deputy Defense Minister Atanas Zapryanov joined their Turkish counterpart Yasar Güler this Thursday in a palace on the Bosphorus, the southern access route to the Black Sea, to Signature. They will take turns chairing the agreement for six months.
“We have jointly decided to sign a protocol between our three countries in order to more effectively combat the danger of mines in the Black Sea by strengthening our existing cooperation and coordination,” said Yasar Güler during the signing, specifying that the negotiations had started “in September”.
While the three signatories belong to the Atlantic Alliance, the Turkish minister stressed that “this initiative will only be open to ships from the three coastal allied countries.” It thus effectively excludes the intervention of external countries, including those of NATO, in order not to contravene the Montreux Convention, signed in 1936, which governs navigation in the Bosphorus in times of war. “Agreed contributions from other actors in certain areas will be possible over time when conditions are met,” the minister added, referring to the end of hostilities.
“Turkey ensures compliance with the Montreux Convention”
NATO in any case welcomed “an important contribution to greater freedom of navigation and food security in the region and beyond”, in a message from its spokesperson on the social network , the Romanian Ministry of Defense, for its part, estimated that “the aggressiveness of the Russian Federation and its contempt for the norms of international law have transformed the Black Sea into not only a regional but an international problem.”
For Sinan Ülgen, researcher member of the Carnegie Europe Institute, “Turkey is ensuring compliance with the Montreux Convention” with the signing of this agreement. “Ankara does not wish to open passage to NATO ships and preferred to act with neighboring countries,” he told AFP, noting that Turkey took the lead in the alliance “because that it is she who has the best marine and military capabilities”. At the beginning of January, Turkey reminded its “British ally” – which offered two Royal Navy mine-clearing vessels to Ukraine – “that these ships will not be authorized to cross the strait as long as the war continues “, recalled Sinan Ülgen.
“Created for defensive purposes only”
From the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, both bordering the Black Sea to the north, fears arose that mines placed by the belligerents to protect their coasts would come loose under the particularly the effect of storms. Only a month later, in March 2022, a drifting mine at the entrance to the Bosphorus worried Turkish fishermen.
Since then, several floating devices have been spotted and recovered without damage. But in late December, a Panama-flagged cargo ship heading to a Ukrainian port to load grain hit a mine and two sailors were injured.
Sofia stressed on Wednesday, on the eve of the signing, that this “totally peaceful initiative is not directed against any country” nor does it intend to “replace the presence or activities of NATO”. Ankara, which has managed to manage its relations with Moscow and kyiv, had also clarified that this agreement “intended to contribute to the security of navigation in the Black Sea, was not formed against or as an alternative to a country or a structure, but was created solely for defensive purposes.