Turkey comes from the premise that the Montreux Convention will continue to be effective even after the Istanbul Canal that will run parallel to the Bosporus Strait is finished and opens, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Wednesday at a joint press conference with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov.
"The Montreux Convention is not linked to the Istanbul Canal and vice versa, the canal is not tied to the convention. We will apply the Montreux [Convention] without any changes as before," he said. "We follow every letter of this convention. Moreover, it not only regulates vessel passage but also movement of military ships, their time of staying in the Black Sea and tonnage."
The minister recalled, "the very text of this convention outlines the procedures to change or denounce it", and they are well known but "there won’t be any changes to the Montreux Convention" after the canal is constructed.
Cavusoglu noted that the construction officially began on June 26 and that Ankara if convinced that a new waterway artery is urgently needed between the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea, while "international business is hugely interested in such a canal".
