Skip to main content

Bulgaria sails against tide as NATO mulls stronger presence in Black Sea




An anti-submarine rocket blasts off a rocket launcher from the Bulgarian navy frigate "Drazki" during the BREEZE 2014 military drill in the Black Sea © Velko Angelov / AFP

As NATO agreed on plans to beef up its naval, land and aerial presence in the Black Sea region at a summit in Poland, Bulgaria once again called for the diffusion of tensions with Russia.


As the NATO summit was underway in Warsaw, Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borissov said that increased NATO activity in the Black Sea, which had been one of the measures proposed in the Polish capital, would lead to a counter reaction from Russia.


“The Black Sea should be declared a demilitarized zone,” Borissov said.

NATO already increased its regional activities following a Crimean vote to join Russia in March 2014. Western nations denounced the move as a land grab by Russia, and NATO insists that the region must remain under Ukrainian sovereignty.

Moscow sees it as a legitimate exercise of the right for self-determination on the part of Crimean people. It said the North Atlantic alliance’s increasing military presence near its territory, including Russia’s Black Sea Fleet base in Crimea, is a threat to its national security.

While some NATO members like Poland are advocating a stronger show of force against Russia, Sofia has spoken out against NATO's plans, which have apparently set the alliance on collision course with Russia.

“There is no such thing as a good fight,” Borissov said over the weekend as quoted by Sofia Globe. “It’s always bad [...it is] better to have a bad peace than a good war.”

The Bulgarian PM instead urged the military block to deescalate the tensions, which, he said hurt economic development in the region. Bulgaria, being an EU member, was impacted badly by the sanctions stand-off with Russia which was launched in the wake of the Crimean transition.

“A zone without military, without submarines, without ships, because that’s a zone in which we expect to extract gas, where all countries have tourism, and greater trade is possible. What would missiles, ships, and submarines bring to the welfare of our people?” Borissov wondered.


A possible military beef-up in the Black Sea would see the creation of NATO’s Black Sea Fleet, formed by member-states with direct access to the sea. Under international law non-Black Sea nations like the US may only temporary deploy a limited number of warships to the region. This makes Russia the strongest naval power in the Black Sea, and NATO complains that it allows Moscow to project presence across the region and into the Mediterranean.



NATO's Black Sea flotilla was initially proposed by Romania in January, and immediately backed by Turkey, another member country, that at the time had tense relations with Moscow. Ukraine, which is not a NATO member, has also expressed its readiness to join the force, even though it only has one combat-worthy warship at the moment. Bulgaria opposed the proposal citing concerns over further militarization.

While a decision on the issue is yet to be made on whether to increase naval power in the region, the matter of NATO presence on the Black Sea will once again be debated by the group's defense ministers in October.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why States Still Use Barrel Bombs

Smoke ascends after a Syrian military helicopter allegedly dropped a barrel bomb over the city of Daraya on Jan. 31.(FADI DIRANI/AFP/Getty Images) Summary Barrel bombs are not especially effective weapons. They are often poorly constructed; they fail to detonate more often than other devices constructed for a similar purpose; and their lack of precision means they can have a disproportionate effect on civilian populations. However, combatants continue to use barrel bombs in conflicts, including in recent and ongoing conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, and they are ideally suited to the requirements of resource-poor states. Analysis Barrel bombs are improvised devices that contain explosive filling and shrapnel packed into a container, often in a cylindrical shape such as a barrel. The devices continue to be dropped on towns all over Syria . Indeed, there have been several documented cases of their use in Iraq over the past months, and residents of the city of Mosul, which was re
Post a Comment
Read more

Russia Looks East for New Oil Markets

Click to Enlarge In the final years of the Soviet Union, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began orienting his foreign policy toward Asia in response to a rising Japan. Putin has also piloted a much-touted pivot to Asia, coinciding with renewed U.S. interest in the area. A good expression of intent was Russia's hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2012 in Vladivostok, near Russia's borders with China and North Korea. Although its efforts in Asia have been limited by more direct interests in Russia's periphery and in Europe, Moscow recently has been able to look more to the east. Part of this renewed interest involves finding new export markets for Russian hydrocarbons. Russia's economy relies on energy exports, particularly crude oil and natural gas exported via pipeline to the West. However, Western Europe is diversifying its energy sources as new supplies come online out of a desire to reduce its dependence on Russian energy supplies . This has
Post a Comment
Read more

LONDON POLICE INDIRECTLY ENCOURAGE CRIMINALS TO ATTACK RUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC PROPERTY

ILLUSTRATIVE IMAGE A few days ago an unknown perpetrator trespassed on the territory of the Russian Trade Delegation in London, causing damage to the property and the vehicles belonging to the trade delegation , Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said during the September 12 press briefing. The diplomat revealed the response by the London police was discouraging. Police told that the case does not have any prospects and is likely to be closed. This was made despite the fact that the British law enforcement was provided with video surveillance tapes and detailed information shedding light on the incident. By this byehavior, British law inforcements indirectly encourage criminals to continue attacks on Russian diplomatic property in the UK. Zakharova’s statement on “Trespassing on the Russian Trade Mission premises in London” ( source ): During our briefings, we have repeatedly discussed compliance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, specif
1 comment
Read more