BIMCO-Baltic and International Maritime Council [ Baltic and International Maritime Conference | Baltic and White Sea Conference ]

Baltic and International Maritime Council | BIMCO [Abbr.]

Baltic and International Maritime Conference | BIMCO [Abbr.]

29. Points out that the EU has a vital interest in a secure and open maritime environment that allows the free passage of commerce and the peaceful, legal and sustainable use of the oceans’ riches; stresses the need to develop an EU maritime foreign policy which aims at protecting and preserving critical infrastructure, open sea routes and natural resources and puts an emphasis on the peaceful resolution of conflicts, within the context of international law and in line with the provisions of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea; ...[+++]looks forward to the adoption of the EU Maritime Security Strategy, in line with the April 2010 Council conclusions, and calls for the development of a specific implementation plan; points out that the integration of maritime surveillance across sectors and borders is already a cross-sectoral tool of the EU Integrated Maritime Policy (IPM); highlights the importance of swiftly implementing the Common Information Sharing Environment project and building a ‘bridge’ between the IPM and the CSDP to improve information sharing between them;

Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO)

16. Welcomes the important contribution made by EU-NAVFOR Operation ATALANTA in the effort to fight piracy and improve maritime security off the coast of Somalia; underlines its role in protecting World Food Programme chartered vessels delivering aid to Somalia and other vulnerable vessels, as well as supplies to AMISOM; welcomes the Council decision of 23 March 2012 prolonging EU-NAVFOR Atalanta to December 2014 and extending its mandate to target the operational bases of pirates onshore; urges the Member States to ensure that EU-NAVFOR ATALANTA is properly supported with adequate surveillance and patrol ships, since the current gain ...[+++]s in the fight against piracy are reversible, as well as with the means for the international community to pursue pirates and their financiers and networks, recognising that the most effective counter-piracy measures have in fact been the on-board vessel protection measures introduced by shipping companies; welcomes, in this context, the recent calls from the maritime industry for the regulation of private maritime security companies, and calls on the International Maritime Organisation, flag states and the maritime industry to work together in order to further develop and implement clear, consistent and enforceable internationally agreed standards regarding the use of privately contracted armed security personnel on board ships, and for private maritime security companies to act in strict adherence with those standards;

13. Calls on the Council and the Commission to redouble their efforts in solving the problems in border-crossing at the EU-Russian borders and to engage in concrete projects and to fully use the Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument and the INTERREG funds for cross-border cooperation, further invites Russia to fully engage in the EU’s ‘Baltic Sea Strategy’, in particular as regards improved maritime safety and environmental protection in the sensitive Baltic Sea;