Participants are including Bulgaria, Belgium, Georgia, Greece, Italy, Spain, Romania, US, Turkey, and France.

The USS Porter, which entered the Black Sea last week, also participates alongside its NATO allies in the exercise.

“Exercise Breeze 20 is critical to strengthening relationships with NATO allies and partners in the Black Sea.Complex exercises such as Breeze, provide an excellent opportunity for U.S. 6th Fleet (C6F) maritime patrol squadrons to increase their operational proficiency and communication interoperability, while conducting combined maritime patrols. Our strong relationship continues to grow with the Bulgarian Navy and other partner nations participating in Breeze, and we look forward to future opportunities to operate together," said Capt. William C. Pennington Jr., commodore of Combined Task Force-67. 

This is the 24th iteration of the annual exercise, which regularly focuses on evaluating the interoperability of multi-national partners and the ability to undertake regional maritime security operations in the Black Sea, as well as providing a forum for Bulgarian Navy unit assessment.

The exercise is set to last until 19 July.

Maritime Business World