Abstract
Abstract The Caspian Sea hybrid legal regime, codified in the 2018 Aktau Convention, outlaws foreign military forces, creates territorial waters and pipeline rights, yet leaves large swaths of the southern seabed undelimited. Since 2022, three vectors have redrawn the strategic baseline: Russia’s episodic closure of the CPC oil corridor, a surge in multilateral drills and spill-readiness tools (CASAREX-24, RETOS), and accelerating environmental decline that may lower mean sea level by up to 10 m this century. Using treaty texts, official communiqués and recent Sentinel-1A imagery, this article evaluates how emerging cooperative mechanisms – naval, environmental and cyber – compensate for residual legal gaps. It finds that voluntary instruments reduce accident risks but cannot deter strategic coercion or regulate desalination-brine discharges, both rising threats. Benchmarking against the Baltic Sea Environment Protection Commission (HELCOM), the study proposes a Caspian Maritime Security Organization with standing spill assets, a traffic-light eutrophication scorecard and a regional cyber-CERT.