Russia and USA to discuss prevention of incidents at sea

During a series of meetings between the visiting group of U.S. naval officials and Russia’s top Navy commanders the sides will discuss the implementation of the Agreement on the prevention of incidents at sea and the future cooperation between the Russian and the U.S. navies, RIA Novosti reports.

Russia has long proposed to develop a draft international agreement on the prevention of incidents underwater to ease tensions over activities of nuclear submarines in neutral waters.

The proposal stipulates that countries which possess submarine fleets should warn other countries about the activities of their submarines in specific areas during patrol or training missions to avoid underwater collisions with submarines of other navies. A collision between a British and a French nuclear sub in the Atlantic Ocean in February 2009 has added urgency to the work on such an agreement.

In August, two Russian attack submarines were spotted in international waters off the U.S. coast, as BarentsObserver reported.

The agreement between Russia and USA on the prevention of incidents at sea was signed in 1972 in Moscow by the Secretary of the Navy for the United States and the Commander in Chief of the Soviet Navy for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In 1973 a protocol to the agreement was negotiated which extends certain provisions of the agreement to include non-military ships.

The agreement was established to increase communication of military activities, thereby preventing miscalculations and avoiding armed conflicts that might arise from a misinterpretation of one side’s intentions as hostile. The agreement is extended automatically every three years.