CIS

Home page

CIS

Russian State Duma ratifies Convention on the legal status of the Caspian Sea

19 September 2019 15:58 (UTC +04:00)

At a plenary meeting on Thursday, the Russian State Duma ratified the Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea, APA reports citing TASS.

The corresponding bill was submitted to the State Duma by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Convention was signed in Aktau on August 12, 2018.

“The Convention contains provisions that fix the regime of shipping and the collective use of the Caspian Sea, the mechanisms for establishing the boundaries of territorial waters and fishing zones, delimiting the bottom and bowels of the Caspian Sea into sectors, the conditions for laying submarine cables and pipelines and other issues of cooperation of coastal states,” the explanatory note to the draft reads.

It is also noted that in accordance with the Convention, the basic principles of the activities of its parties in the Caspian Sea, in particular, include the absence of armed forces from it that do not belong to the parties.

It is emphasized that clarification of the limits of the spread of sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction of the coastal states in the Caspian will contribute to strengthening "stability and predictability" in relations between the Russian Federation and partners in the region, creating favorable conditions for expanding mutually beneficial cooperation in areas such as security, transport and shipping, fishing, exploration and production of hydrocarbon resources and others.

"The Convention establishes other rules than those stipulated by the legislation of the Russian Federation. Thus, in particular, the Convention provides for legal regimes regarding the delimitation of internal and territorial waters, fishing zones, as well as sections of the bottom and bowels of the Russian Federation and other coastal states," the document says.

At the same time, the text states that the legal regimes operating in inland and territorial waters, zones and sections are different from the legal regimes operating in the sea spaces of the Russian Federation - in inland sea waters, the territorial sea, the exclusive economic zone and on the continental shelf.