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Conflict in Syria

Special services see militants returning home from Syria — CIS anti-terror chief

ODINTSOVO DISTRICT (Moscow Region), February 15. /TASS/. Special services are noting the instances of militants’ return to the countries of their living from the Syrian conflict zone, Head of the CIS Anti-Terror Center Colonel-General Andrei Novikov said on Wednesday.

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"The information that we have received and is confirmed by our partners shows that the number of militants who are trying to penetrate the Syrian-Iraqi zone is contracting very intensively now while the process of the return of such persons to the countries of their living is currently under way," Novikov said during a break in the work of the 10th conference of the heads of CIS anti-terror centers that had opened in the Moscow Region.

The conference focused on the issues related to the border regime and the filtration of militants returning from the zone of combat operations.

According to him, the conference will also discuss measures to counter terrorism financing on the CIS territory, a draft agreement on the exchange of information among CIS states on the struggle against terrorism and other violent manifestations of extremism and their financing.

"The agreement was signed quite long ago and now the process of its adoption in the states is under way." Novikov noted.

The agreement will intensify operational interaction among special services, he said.

"We’ll be exchanging secret information among special services of the CIS states relating to the struggle against terrorism and extremism," he explained.

The conference’s agenda was prompted by the situation in the Afghan-Pakistani and the Syrian-Iraqi zones where the Islamic State (IS) international terrorist organization outlawed in Russia is concentrating its potential, he said.

Representatives of actually all special services and law-enforcement agencies of the CIS states - Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan - have arrived at the 10th jubilee CIS anti-terror conference, he said.

"The Anti-Terror Center has existed for more than 16 years and we’re working out an algorithm of actions [against terrorism and extremism] and over these years cooperation of special services and special bodies of the CIS states has been strengthening and deepening," he said.

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CIS Syrian conflict

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