site.btaThree NATO Ships Ensure Safety of Vessels Crossing Black Sea

Bourgas, February 10 (BTA) - Three ships, part of NATO's Standing Mine Countermeasures Group Two (SNMCMG2), ensure the safety and security of the vessels crossing the Black Sea, SNMCMG2 Commander, Royal Navy Captain Justin Hains, said Saturday, speaking at a news conference which was held on board HMS Enterprise, the Group's flagship.

The three ships: HMS Enterprise, TCG Akcay and ROS Lt Lupu Dinescu, arrived in Bourgas on February 9 and will remain there until February 11.

In the next twelve months the three ships will carry out activities in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean.

Captain Hains said that the exercises conducted with the ships make it possible to change their role from training into military very quickly, should a crisis or a conflict break.

Lieutenant Capital Abdullah Yildiz, commander of the Turkish mine hunter, said that during a training in the area of the Romanian port of Constanta three days ago the sailors found and defused an old sea bottom mine. Yildiz said that similar type of mines during World War Two were used against submarines. He said that the discovered mine was at a great depth and did not pose a threat to commercial vessels. However, some mines are activated by just the sound of a passing ship, he said.