NATO officials are also weighing the possibility of moving existing anti-drone countermeasures to the region after receiving requests from Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey, diplomats told Politico. The three countries are also cooperating on an initiative to safeguard freedom of navigation in the Black Sea, which Bulgarian Prime Minister Radev plans to present to the European Union this week.
Restrictions and wars in the Black Sea
The naval forces of NATO countries have avoided military exercises in the Black Sea since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, in accordance with the 1936 Montreux Convention that gives Turkey authority to restrict the passage of ships through straits leading to the Black Sea. This Turkish application has also prevented Russia from reinforcing or rotating its Black Sea fleet during the war.
Despite lacking much of a conventional navy, Ukraine has managed to largely neutralize Russian warships and disrupt Russian-linked shipping and ports through the use of aerial and maritime drones. But Russia has countered with its own drone attacks against Ukrainian ports and ships, and sometimes attacks ships from other countries in the region.
Since the fall of 2023, Ukrainian ships have typically gotten stuck on shipping routes passing through Romanian, Bulgarian or Turkish territorial waters in the Black Sea, according to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. This type of shipping across the Black Sea is especially crucial for Ukraine’s agricultural grain exports, which account for more than 90 percent.
The recent series of likely Russian attacks in the Black Sea is disrupting shipping transporting Ukraine’s latest harvest to the rest of Europe, with some cargo being diverted overland or via the Danube River, Politico reported.
These unprecedented attacks in waters near NATO countries coincide with a growing wave of incidents attributed to Russian hybrid or gray zone warfare tactics. Such incidents include an attempted explosive drone attack on a Ukrainian cargo plane at Leipzig airport in Germany and a Russian ship loaded with explosives found floating near a Romanian offshore gas platform in the Black Sea.
But since the start of the war, Türkiye, Romania and Bulgaria have continued to upgrade their navies while forging closer cooperation on maritime security, according to Carnegie. Increasing dangers to shipping in the Black Sea will likely accelerate this cooperative trend and for the NATO alliance as a whole.
