FSB director's opinion on SORB

The director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), Nikolai Patrushev, praised the work of the CIS Council of Heads of Security Bodies and Secret Services (SORB).

The council has been purposefully and consistently moving toward the formation of a single and equitable system of antiterrorist security, Mr. Patrushev said at the council's 16th meeting which opened in Sochi, a resort city on the Black Sea.

"Our departments' operative elements are actively involved in coordinating joint activities, which the concrete positive results of the work confirm," he said.

The meeting is being held before the third international conference of the heads of secret services, security agencies and law-enforcement bodies.

The director of the FSB said, "the joint decisions adopted at the 16th SORB meeting will make it possible to come from common positions on all topical questions regarding global antiterrorism cooperation."

According to him, at the conference measures to improve the interaction between CIS member states' security agencies and secret services in detecting and stopping the activity of members of international terrorist organizations and in eliminating the their training bases and sources of funding, will be planned.

At the council's meeting the heads of CIS secret services will also hear a report on the operation of the CIS antiterrorist center in 2003.

The heads of the secret services of ten CIS member states - Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, Tajikistan, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Moldova - are participating in the SORB meeting.

Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, members of the SORB supervisory council, sent representatives to Sochi.