Bulgaria calls for total demilitarisation of Black Sea

Bulgaria has explicitly dismissed Romania's proposal to establish a NATO fleet in the Black Sea. In January, Romania called for a flotilla to address Russia's territorial aggression after it annexed the Crimea in 2014. However, Bulgaria has called for a total demilitarisation of the region. Turkey, which was initially supportive along with Ukraine, is now also lukewarm on the proposal. NATO's Black Sea naval force was supposed to be one of the key measures to contain Russia, although, in accordance with the 1936 Montreux Convention, the only NATO members that could create a permanent fleet are Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey. Bulgaria says its decision was not due to pressure from Moscow but based on its wariness of Turkey's foreign policy and because Bulgaria's leadership has received virtually nothing from the West in return for dropping lucrative bilateral deals with Russia. NATO will make its final decisions in October.

"Surely, it is easier to explain Bulgaria's unpredictability by invoking Russian energy blackmailing, implicit pressure, a bribe or other scary KGB tricks," the deputy editor of Carnegie.ru noted.

This explanation is "psychologically convenient," he said, but in this case it is an incorrect one. "Without any Russian pressure involved, many countries on NATO's eastern flank are unreliable; they do not trust each other and have grudges against the West."

The bloc's Black Sea naval force was meant to be one of the key measures aimed at containing Russia. These include the already tested and mission ready "Spearhead Force," as well as four battle groups that are expected to be deployed in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland in 2017.