MOSCOW, October 27. /TASS/. Russian military inspectors are expected to make a supervisory flight over the drill and firing ranges in Spain and Portugal where NATO is holding its largest exercise since 2002 codenamed the Trident Juncture, Sergey Ryzhkov, the chief of Russia's national center for the reduction of nuclear threat told reporters on Monday.
"From October 27 through October 30, 2015, a group of Russian experts plans holding an inspection of the above mentioned region of space (the one where the exercise is held TASS) in the format of implementation of the the 2011 Vienna Document on trust-building and security measures," he said.
In the same period, a Russian inspecting group will observe the military drill in Portugal, Ryzhkov added. This inspection will be done with the aid of cross-country automobile transport and a helicopter.
The goal of the inspection efforts is to size up the scale of the military activity that is subject to notification or to confirm the absence of any such activity. The area subject to inspection is up to 18,000 sq km.
The Russian inspectors' itinerary includes trips to firing ranges and also daily updates on the situation from the commands of regiments and units.
The field phase of Trident Juncture began on October 21. The maneuvers are held on sixteen military bases and drill ranges of Spain, Italy and Portugal, all of them NATO members, and also embrace the western sector of the Mediterranean and Spain's Atlantic coast and the airspace above these territories.
A total of 36,000 servicemen, 140 aircraft and 90 submarines and surface ships from 30 countries, including the formally neutral Austria and Sweden are engaged in the war games that will continue through to November 6.