ForMin Melescanu: Black Sea region highly sensitive, joint action required

Foreign Minister Teodor Melescanu said on Tuesday that the Black Sea region is highly sensitive and that a "burden as to finding a balance of the powers in this area" has started to spawn from its geostrategic importance. 

"Historically, the Black Sea region is a point of intersection, a point where the West meets the East and the North meets the South. This region has been and further is an area of continuous cooperation that requires all those here to find common ground and it is a gateway to Central Europe. (...) After years and years of lingering on the edge of Europe, in the last 10 years this region has regained its vocation, meaning that it has become the next frontier of the European way of thinking as regards energy security, trade connections and other important political areas. Despite this, the geostrategic importance of the region has started generating a burden as to finding a balance of powers here. We see the butterfly effect and many other effects, as developments overtake us and things change," Melescanu told the Atlantic-Black Sea Security Forum - Bracing for The Storm - Is United Western Action Possible? organized at the Palace of Parliament. 

He underscored that the use of force in Georgia in 2008, Russia's annexing the Crimean peninsula, the conflicts in Georgia and the Republic of Moldova, and the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan seriously affect security in the Black Sea region. 

The Foreign Minister argued that joint action is needed, pointing out that this is the only possible answer to the current state of play. According to Melescanu, greater coherence in allied action is required in terms of deterrence and defence. Melescanu also mentioned that Romania wants cooperation in the Black Sea region to continue. 

In his turn, President of the Aspen Institute Romania Mircea Geoana said that the Black Sea region is a "microcosm of geopolitics, a microcosm of competition among regional and global players." 

"In the Black Sea region we are faced not just with traditional threats, but also with various degrees of threats or challenges in society and only," Mircea Geoana said. 

The Atlantic-Black Sea Security Forum - Bracing for the Storm - Is Western Action Possible? is organized by the Aspen Institute Romania in partnership with the NATO Public Diplomacy Division and the Bucharest office of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.