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Russia slams ‘unacceptable’ NATO’s violations of Montreux Convention — senior diplomat

The Western states prefer to insist on their rightness instead of being guided by international law, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov noted

MOSCOW, December 10. /TASS/. Russia reports some violations of the Montreux Convention by NATO and emphasizes that such a situation is unacceptable, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said at an online briefing on Friday.

"We are witnessing some problems relating to the observance of the Montreux Convention by NATO countries. We do not ignore them and <…> declare this practice unacceptable through our diplomatic channels. It is not surprising, since those who engaged in this are throwing themselves into the ideology of replacing international law with a rules-based order," the Russian senior diplomat noted.

Ryabkov recalled that the Montreux Convention had contributed to facilitating stability in the Black Sea region for several decades. "Now something has changed, which some countries party to the Convention are not satisfied with," the senior diplomat went on to say. According to him, the Western states prefer to insist on their rightness instead of being guided by international law.

The Convention, adopted in 1936 in the city of Montreux, enshrined free passage through the Bosphorus strait and the Dardanelles for trade ships only. Meanwhile, it significantly limits the class and displacement of military ships for non-Black Sea nations. Black Sea nations may move military ships of any class through the straits during peacetime by notifying the Turkish authorities beforehand.