Agency WPS
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
December 17, 2004, Friday
RUSSIAN AIR FORCE WILL RUN SEVERAL EXERCISES IN 2005, SOME OF THEM
TOGETHER WITH CIS PARTNERS
Colonel General Boris Chelsov, Air Force Chief-of-Staff, says that
several exercises, some of them together with CIS partners, will be
run in 2005. Units of all branches of the service will be involved in
the maneuvers. Exercises within the framework of the CIS United
Antiaircraft Defense System and a counter-terrorism drill are planned
as well.
Foreign reconnaissance planes patrol Russian borders, and the Russian
Air Force is supposed “to prevent trespassing”. “It has everything it
needs to accomplish that,” Chelsov said.
Lieutenant General Aitech Bizhev, Air Force Second-in-Command for the
CIS United Antiaircraft Defense System, says that Exercise
Rubezh-2005 will be run on the territory of Tajikistan in April 2005.
Another exercise at Ashuluk testing site near Astrakhan will take
place in August. Units from the Russian, Armenian, Belarusian,
Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and Tajik national armies will participate in the
exercise. Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan may join the exercise too, and
Ukraine will send its observers.
Source: Voyenno-Promyshlenny Kurier, No 49, December 15 – 21, 2004,
p. 5
Translated by A. Ignatkin