Session of CIS Defence Ministers over - 14 June, 2002 - News

The session of the Council of Defence Ministers from the Commonwealth of Independent States ended with session participants taking a series of decisions to streamline cooperation on the way towards further integration of CIS members.

According to Russia's Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov, the session focused its attention on military and military-and-technical cooperation /including ways to develop the CIS air defence system/, and on measures to perfect the activity of the CDM and its working bodies. "The process of creating the mechanisms necessary to ensure the safety of each member of the Commonwealth and of CIS as a whole continues at a qualitatively different level," said Ivanov.

The sides agreed to exchange information about accidents involving aviation and to create a data bank to store this information, went on the minister. He also said the sides had approved a list of air fields in CIS states that can be used by CIS aircraft, and decided to create a uniform catalogue of military-and-technical produce.

By the time the next session begins, the ministers will prepare a decision on a uniform communications system of CIS Armed Forces. "On June 15, the ministers will watch an exercise outside Bishkek involving Collective Forces of Rapid Deployment," reported Ivanov. "After that, they will go to Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan to watch a joint tactical exercise."