PUGUS, Tajikistan: Russia and five former Soviet republics have set up a joint military command to oversee a rapid reaction force amid increased security risks in Central Asia, their leaders said Monday.
The announcement was made after a summit here by the leaders of Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, which make up the Collective Security Treaty Organization (DKB).
"The main goal of the DKB is to assure the security and territorial integrity of the member countries. To work more efficiently, we had to create the appropriate instruments," Russian President Vladimir Putin told journalists after the summit, held at the summer home of Tajik President Emomali Rakhmanov outside the capital Dushanbe. "For the first time, a joint general staff of the armed forces of DKB member states has been created -- we have defined its composition and its financing," said Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev.
The summit also named Nikolai Bordiuzha, the 53-year-old former head of the Russian Security Council, secretary general of the organization.
The DKB was set up in 1992 to boost cooperation on shared security threats such as terrorism, drug trafficking and organized crime. The leaders also said that they would set up a system to facilitate arms sales between member countries.
"According to the DKB, if there is a threat of aggression against one country, other member state can give help, including military aid," Nazarbayev said.
The doctrine is similar to that of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an alliance that was founded to counter the growing Soviet threat in Europe after World War II.
Alexander Lukashenko, the authoritarian president of Belarus, said the grouping moved to focus on building up its common armed force following the war in Iraq, launched by the United States and Britain without the backing of the United Nations.
"The situation in the world has prompted us to do this -- we must ensure the security of our countries and our people," Lukashenko said.
"We have noticed that certain forces within the United Nations are attempting to break the global system and its key link, the United Nations," he said.
Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev said his country would welcome an air rapid deployment force and would officially open a base to house the aircraft in June.
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