Paul Goble
Since the 1990s, Turkish leaders have called for the construction of a canal to the west of Istanbul between the Mediterranean and Black seas to take pressure off the Bosphorus Strait, which passes through the middle of Istanbul. The proposed canal would also circumvent the limitations on the passage of ships established by the Montreux Convention in 1936. In 2011, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made the construction of the canal a centerpiece of his national policies. The enormous costs of this enterprise (estimates now exceed $10 billion), environmental concerns within Türkiye, and security concerns from other countries, most notably Russia, have thus far hindered the construction of the canal (Kazinform, May 7). Last month, the Turkish government launched a new initiative to build the canal, having arrested some of its most prominent opponents and claiming that Ankara will secure funding from private sources, as the canal is expected to facilitate increased trade (Türkiye Gazetesi, October 10).
Moscow views this new push as having little to do with expanding commerce between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. It instead sees it as an attempt to annul the Montreux Convention’s limitations, which would allow North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) warships to enter the Black Sea and challenge Russia (Voenno-Politicheskaya Analitika, November 6). Russian analysts have signaled that the Kremlin will try to prevent the construction of the canal by playing up Turkish environmental concerns and stressing the consequences of circumventing or annulling the Montreux Convention (Fond Strategicheskoi Kul’tury, October 16). Moscow and its allies inside Türkiye have seemingly been successful in blocking the construction of the canal up to now, they appear to expect that they will be able to do so again, an attitude that may increase tensions between Moscow and Ankara in the coming months.
No comments:
Post a Comment