SECURITY AND STABILITY ARCHITECTURE IN THE BLACK SEA

Year 2007, Volume: 12 Issue: 2, 95 - 117, 01.01.2007

Bülent Karadeniz

Abstract

The Black Sea constitutes a region where the interests of four geopolitical entities intersect, namely, the EU with its “Neighbourhood Policy of the EU”, the USA in search of a gateway to Eurasia, “Broader Middle East”, and North Africa, the Russian Federation, and lastly Turkey; all having potential contradictory geopolitical interests which may lead to conflictual situations in this area. Nevertheless, the Organisation of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation, as a platform, provides harmonisation of interests among political entities and establishes complementary relations between member states. In this sense, this paper contains several propositions which may help enhance the role of the Organisation of the BSEC due to its geopolitical strategic location that has special importance at the heart of Eurasia. It will be argued that in addition to strengthening its main functions as an organisation for economic cooperation, the Organisation of the BSEC may also offer a structural basis in the fields of combating asymmetric risks and threats as well as organised crime. Moreover, Turkey’s security concept of the Black Sea is pictured as embracing a clear distinction between the maritime domain and the lands of the Black Sea Basin in relevance to the Montreux Convention of 1936, which imposes limits to the ships of third parties on their numbers, tonnage, and duration of their stay. In this line, the Black Sea Naval Cooperation Task Group BLACKSEAFOR-a regional on-call task force , the Operation of Black Sea Harmony, and the Coordination Centre among the coastguard units of the littoral states established in Bourgas are evaluated as regional maritime domain security arrangements. Furthermore, the new interests of the EU in the Black Sea after the accession of Bulgaria and Romania and the Wider Black Sea strategy of the USA are also examined. The Black Sea constitutes a region where the interests of four geopolitical entities intersect, namely, the EU with its “Neighbourhood Policy of the EU”, the USA in search of a gateway to Eurasia, “Broader Middle East”, and North Africa, the Russian Federation, and lastly Turkey; all having potential contradictory geopolitical interests which may lead to conflictual situations in this area. Nevertheless, the Organisation of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation, as a platform, provides harmonisation of interests among political entities and establishes complementary relations between member states. This article concludes that the security arrangements in the Black Sea Basin, particularly in the maritime area, must be based on making use of the existing regional mechanisms that constitute substantial confidence building mechanisms for the region. But most importantly, they prove as efficient security-providing tools. The article summarises the key words of the regional cooperation policy as regional ownership, transparency and inclusiveness. It also emphasises that Black Sea maritime security must rely on three principles: contribution and the will of the costal states, effective sharing of intelligence and information between the regional mechanisms and Euro-Atlantic security mechanisms, and respect for the regime of Montreux Convention

Keywords

The Organisation of the BSEC, Ctrengthening, Core countries, Observer Status, the EU, Local Authorities Congress, Permanent Bodies, Transnational Networks, Trade and Development Bank, Regional Identity, Maritime Domain, Trilateral Consultation, Confidence Building, Wider Black Sea Strategy, NATO, Regional Ownership, Transparency, Montreux Convention.