Moscow. October 18. INTERFAX - The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) is conducting maneuvers in Tajikistan on October 18-23, taking into account possible negative scenarios for the development of the situation in Afghanistan, said Anatoly Sidorov, chief of the CSTO joint staff.
"Of course, when developing the concept of the exercise, we simply had to take into account possible scenarios for the development of events on the Tajik-Afghan border. We hope that considering the worst option during the exercise, we will not come to it in real life," he said.
"A serious feature of this exercise is that it is held at a training ground in the immediate vicinity of the Tajik-Afghan border, and in such a turbulent period of time when the whole world is concerned about the situation on the borders of Afghanistan, and in particular on the Tajik-Afghan border," Sidorov said.
In October, three CSTO exercises will be held in Tajikistan: the Echelon-2021 logistics support forces, the Search-2021 intelligence, and the Interaction-2021 rapid response forces.
The exercises will take place against the background of the Taliban movement (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) coming to power in Afghanistan.
The CSTO includes Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan.
Sidorov said earlier that the maneuvers in Tajikistan will become a stage of the CSTO operational-strategic exercise "Combat Brotherhood-2021". In total, more than 5 thousand military personnel will be involved in this strategic exercise. The final stage of the operational-strategic exercise will take place on the territory of Russia.
