A small channel at the mouth of the Danube “opened a crack” between Ukrainian And Romaniaraising fears of Russian interference and a possible reduction in NATO-allied Romania’s support for Kyiv.

The controversy erupted when Kiev announced last month that it was deepening the Bystry Canal, a roughly 10km long Ukrainian canal that connects the Black Sea with the Kiliya section of the Danube River, forming a natural border between the two countries.

The deepening of the Bystroe River (from 3.9 m to 6.5 m) was “the first since gaining independence” from the Soviet Union in 1989, Ukraine’s infrastructure ministry said, adding that Ukraine “continues to develop the Danube port complex.”

The expansion of shipping channels in the Danube Delta is of key importance for Kyiv, which seeks to create alternative export routes after the blockade of the Black Sea ports by Russia during the war.

Despite a UN-backed deal signed last year to open three ports as a “breather” for Ukraine’s war-torn economy, Kiev appears determined to secure viable routes that offer greater protection against Russian aggression.

But dredging on the canal, which Kiev says is part of Europe’s Solidarity Roads program, has drawn backlash from Bucharest as Romanian officials say the work threatens the Danube Delta, a protected natural reserve known for its biodiversity and rich avifauna.

Reactions and attempts to mitigate

The Romanian Foreign Ministry summoned the Ukrainian ambassador, demanding that the neighbor stop “all dredging works if their purpose goes beyond the current maintenance of the waterway.”

The Embassy of Ukraine in Bucharest hastened to clarify that the work was of an “operational nature” to remove silt, which reduced the depth of the canal, while deciding call for Romania to “not play with Russian propaganda” aimed at undermining support for Kyiv.

For its part, the President of Romania, Klaus Iohannis, a country that, as a member of the EU and NATO, has strongly supported Ukraine since the first moment of the Russian invasion, decriminalize “inflammatory speech”recommending that citizens let experts determine “what’s really going on there”.

“I do not consider it appropriate to attack Ukrainians on the basis of uncertain facts. They don’t need reprimands, they need support,” Klaus Johannis said during a meeting with Joe Biden last month in Warsaw.

In an effort to reduce tonnage, Ukraine has granted Romania’s request to conduct its own hydrographic surveys in the Bystre Canal starting on the 15th of this month to clarify “contradictory information”.

On Tuesday, the two sides met, brokered by the European Commission, in Izmail, a Ukrainian port city on the Danube, about 60km west of Bystry.

Source: Financial Times.