It was certainly a fruitful decision to set up such groups. The arrangement will reduce anti-terror effort costs and provide necessary urgency to cope with whatever terror challenge, he added.
Operation Control Groups were established a mere two months ago, and they are still in the making, remarked Nikolai Rogozhkin, in command of the Interior troops, who attended the games.
Today's exercise followed Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliev's order, and based on the Rostov regional Operation Control Group. It involved units of the police, Interior troops, the Federal Security Service, the Defence Ministry, and the Ministry for Emergency and Calamity Relief-a total 1,500.
Operation Control Groups are permanent bodies for direct control of united branches and services to fight paramilitary formations, prevent and combat acts of terror and sabotage, and cope with their dire consequences.
Today's games included a battle to rout a conventional gang that had seized a village and taken hostages.
North Caucasian instability, recent heinous terror acts in and round Moscow, and in Beslan, and frequent threats to commit even more tragic acts all have put police on the alert, Colonel-General Sergei Schadrin of the police, Deputy Interior Minister, said to newsmen today. The ministry board for federal district Centre has established an anti-terror T squad, he announced.
The district was victim to five terror acts this year-two in Moscow, another two in the Voronezh Region, and one in the Kursk Region. 23 crimes with an extremist background were committed-eleven of these in Moscow. More than three thousand false alarms were made, said General Schadrin.
