Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania reached an agreement yesterday on demining the Black Sea, Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler announced.
The three NATO member countries, which intend to strengthen security in the waters of the Black Sea, will create a committee composed of the commanders of the Turkish, Bulgarian and Romanian naval forces.
“With the beginning of the war [entre Rússia e Ucrânia]mines adrift in the Black Sea constitute a threat,” said Guler, quoted by Turkish channel TRT.
“To overcome it, we have come this far with the joint efforts of our Bulgarian and Romanian allies,” he added.
The commanders of the naval forces of the three countries will meet twice a year and decisions on activities will be taken unanimously, according to the Spanish agency Europa Press.
The initiative will only be open to ships from the three countries and contributions from other actors will be determined by unanimous decision of Bulgaria, Turkey and Romania.
The Russian Navy has been laying mines along the Ukrainian coast in the Black Sea since the start of the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Since then, some of these mines have appeared in Turkish, Bulgarian and Romanian waters, posing a danger to navigation in the area.
In December, Ukrainian authorities reported that a Panamanian-flagged ship passing through the area to collect grain from Ukraine struck a Russian mine in the Black Sea, causing two injuries.
Ukraine has created a maritime corridor for commercial ships, which first pass close to the Bulgarian and Romanian coasts.
Turkey controls maritime and naval traffic in the Black Sea, which must pass through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits before reaching the Aegean and Mediterranean seas.
Negotiations on the agreement began in October 2023, according to the Ukrainian news agency Ukrinform.
