The BSPC Standing Committee agreed to a joint meeting of delegations of the Standing Committees of both Parliamentary Assemblies
On 2 April 2019, the Joint Meeting of the Standing Committees of the BSPC and the PABSEC on the topic “Safeguarding our Oceans and Marine Life” was held in Istanbul. The meeting was attended by parliamentarians from Albania, Azerbaijan, the Baltic Assembly, Finland, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hamburg, Latvia, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Sweden, Turkey and Ukraine as well as experts in these issues from the Black Sea Region and from HELCOM as well as from international organizations in Turkey.
The participants expressed their highest esteem for this session and called for these meetings to continue.
The speeches at the Opening Session were delivered by Mr Cemal Oztürk, the PABSEC Vice-President and the Head of the PABSEC Turkish Delegation, Mr Jorodd Asphjell, the President of the BSPC, as well as the Secretaries General of both organisations. The speakers noted the successful start to the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding between the PABSEC and the BSPC and the usefulness of further continuation of the joint activities in the future.
During the discussions, interventions were made by Prof Jānis Vucāns, the President of the Baltic Assembly, Mr Konstantinos Morfidis, the Head of the PABSEC Hellenic Delegation, Ms Valentina Pivnenko, the Head of the Russian Delegation to the BSPC, Mr George Visan, member of the PABSEC Romanian Delegation, Ms Carola Veit, the President of the State Parliament of Hamburg, Ms Olena Masorina, member of the PABSEC Ukrainian delegation, Mr Andrea Marto, the PABSEC Vice-President and the Head of the PABSEC Albanian Delegation, Mr Eldar Guliyev, the Head of the PABSEC Azerbaijani Delegation, Mr Mikhail Emelianov, Head of the PABSEC Russian delegation, Mr Pyry Niemi, the Head of the Swedish delegation to the BSPC, and Ms Cecilie Tenfjord Toftby, the Vice-Head of the Swedish delegation to the BSPC.
Presentations were made by the following experts: Ms Iryna Makarenko, representative of the Permanent Secretariat of the Commission on the Protection of the Black Sea Against Pollution, Mr Markus Helavuori, the representative of the Permanent Secretariat of the Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission – the Helsinki Commission (HELCOM), Professor Bairam Ozturk, President of the Turkish Marine Research Foundation of Istanbul University, and Mrs Rositsa Stoeva, Executive Manager of the BSEC PERMIS. The experts answered a number of questions from the MPs and discussed with them the challenges of a sustainable maritime policy.
In the course of the meeting, both MPs and experts provided a wide range of information on the state of the two seas as well as on necessary measures to improve their ecological status but also on the corresponding activities to protect the seas in individual countries of both regions.
At the end, the importance of organising the joint activities between the two Assemblies was emphasised, and it was decided to continue the practice of holding such joint meetings in the future. The sides agreed to prepare a joint documentation according to the results of the meeting.