Post-Soviet security bloc to hold six tactical drills this year

MOSCOW, March 20. /TASS/. Member states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) will conduct six tactical drills and one strategic exercise this year, acting CSTO Secretary General Valery Semerikov told TASS on Wednesday. The ‘Interaction-2019’ special tactical drills will be held with the CSTO Collective Rapid Reaction Force while the ‘Unbreakable Brotherhood-2019’ exercises will be conducted with the post-Soviet security bloc’s peacekeeping troops this year, the acting Secretary General said. The CSTO will also hold the ‘Poisk-2019’ (‘Search-2019’) drills with reconnaissance units, the ‘Grom-2019’ (‘Thunder-2019’) exercises with anti-drug squads, the ‘Air Birdge-2019’ maneuvers with the bloc’s Collective Air Force and the ‘Echelon-2019’ war games with logistics units, he said. "All the above-mentioned exercises are planned to be conducted amid the common strategic situation as part of the Combat Brotherhood-2019 strategic drills on the territory of Belarus, Russia and Tajikistan," Semerikov said. The ‘Echelon-2019’ drills that will be held for the first time this year will be conducted on the territory of Russia in the East-European collective security region. The scenario and the participants of the drills will be defined in the course of staff negotiations in the second half of April, the acting CSTO Secretary General said. The CSTO’s drills will involve the most prepared and well-equipped units of the bloc’s member states, he said. Read more