Black Sea Forum for Partnership and Dialogue
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The inaugural session of the Black Sea Forum for Partnership and Dialogue (BSF) was held on June 4-6, 2006 in Bucharest. The Forum is a Romanian initiative, initially meant to hold annual presidential-level summits (the venues rotating among participant countries) and thematic or sectoral-cooperation meeting during those annual intervals. The Forum is not meant to create new regional institutions, but rather to turn into a regular consultative process among countries of the extended Black Sea region (defined as including the South Caucasus to the Caspian Sea) and between this group of countries and international organizations such as the European Union. After the inaugural summit, no other summits were planned.
After Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU the Forum may become an EU initiative for cooperation with the Black and Caspian Sea states similar to the Northern Dimension initiative for the Nordic countries and Baltic Sea states.
[edit] Membership
Presidents Traian Băsescu of Romania, Vladimir Voronin of Moldova, Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine, Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia, Robert Kocharian of Armenia, Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan, a State Minister from Turkey and a representative of Bulgaria signed a Joint Declaration at the inaugural session of the BSF. They were joined by senior officials from the United States, NATO, EU, etc.
- Members
- Observers
Russia did not send a delegation to the Forum. It was represented by its ambassador to Romania, Nikolai Tolkachev.
