MOSCOW, June 1. /TASS/. The State Duma has approved a bill on Thursday denouncing the Russian-Ukrainian treaty on cooperation in the use of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait.

The document was introduced to the Russian parliament by President Vladimir Putin on May 24. According to the explanatory note to the bill, a fundamentally new situation emerged after the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions joined Russia, because now the coasts of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait belong solely to Russia.

Sea of Azov and Kerch Strait

The total area of the Sea of Azov is 39,000 square kilometers. Two major navigable rivers of Russia - the Don and the Kuban - flow into it. Azov is connected to the Black Sea by the Kerch Strait, which is 41 kilometers long, 4 kilometers to 15 kilometers wide, and up to 15 meters deep.

During Soviet era

The Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait until 1991 had been the internal waters of the Soviet Union.

In early 1941, according to a special order of the Soviet government, the Kerch Strait became the administrative border between the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (part of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic) and the Krasnodar Region. In 1954, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued a decree On the Transfer of the Crimean Region from the RSFSR to the Ukrainian SSR. Due to the fact that the water area of the coastal seas belonged to the Soviet Union, and not to its individual constituent entities, the division of the Sea of Azov after 1954 was not carried out. The administrative border between Crimea and the Krasnodar Territory was established only along the Kerch Strait and the coastline of the Krasnodar Territory and Crimea in the Sea of Azov.

After Soviet Union’s collapse

In the post-Soviet era, the status of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait, which is the only natural outlet from the Sea of Azov, became a contentious issue in Russian-Ukrainian relations. In 1991, Ukraine defined its maritime border along the scour line between Krasnodar Region and the Tuzla Island, which in 1941 was transferred from the Temryuk District of the Krasnodar Region to the Crimean ASSR under a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR. After that the navigable part of the Kerch Strait ended up on the Ukrainian side.

In December 1999, Ukraine and Russia entered into detailed discussions on the problems of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait. There were more than 20 rounds of talks on the delimitation of the Azov-Kerch basin. The January 28, 2003 treaty on the Russian-Ukrainian state border, signed by Presidents Vladimir Putin, of Russia, and his Ukrainian counterpart Leonid Kuchma, defined the land border between the two states. Article 5 of the treaty put on record the status of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait as internal waters of the two countries. The question of the maritime border was singled out as a separate subject matter for negotiations.

Treaty on cooperation in using Azov Sea, Kerch Strait

A treaty between Russia and Ukraine on cooperation in using the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait was signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma in Kerch on December 24, 2003 (ratified in April 2004). This document consolidated the water area's historically established status of internal waters of the two countries, and also asserted the freedom of navigation in the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait for their merchant vessels and warships. Entry into the Sea of Azov and Kerch Strait without mutual consent of Russia and Ukraine of warships of third countries was prohibited. The document also noted the importance of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait for the economic development of both countries, as well as the need to preserve the Azov-Kerch water area as an integral economic and natural complex. The treaty stipulated that the question of the state border line on the Azov will be solved separately.

State border issue

The issue of distributing jurisdiction between Russia and Ukraine in the Sea of Azov remained unsettled. The Russian side suggested drawing the state border line on the seabed, making the water surface and resources a shared asset. Ukraine insisted on the establishment of the border line on the water surface as well.

On July 12, 2012 Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich signed a joint statement on the delimitation of maritime spaces in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea, as well as in the Kerch Strait. The two parties intended to subsequently sign a bilateral treaty that would settle the relevant issues, but this plan was not destined to materialize.

Denunciation of treaties on Sea of Azov, Kerch Strait

After the Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics and Zaporozhye and Kherson regions became parts of the Russian Federation on September 30, 2022, the Sea of Azov effectively became Russia’s inland reservoir (of the four newly-incorporated territories of Russia only the LPR is land-locked).

On February 24, 2023, the Ukrainian parliament (Verkhovna Rada) denounced the treaty between Russia and Ukraine on cooperation in the use of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait of December 24, 2003.

Also, the Ukrainian MPs voted to withdraw from the agreement on the establishment of the Black Sea Naval Cooperation Task Group (BLACKSEAFOR). The agreement was signed in Istanbul (Turkey) on April 2, 2001 by Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine. Among BLACKSEAFOR’s declared goals was the promotion of security and stability in the Black Sea and beyond it, the strengthening friendship and good-neighborly relations between the states of the region, and tighter cooperation among the navies of the signatories to the agreement.