VIENNA, June 21. /TASS/. The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a security alliance of post-Soviet states, is ready to send its peacekeepers to missions under the UN mandate, the CSTO deputy secretary general has told TASS.
"We conducted negotiations, and our aim was to get a certificate for our peacekeeping units , our CSTO peacekeeping contingent was certified to be ready for implementing the tasks performed in peacekeeping operations of UN missions or under the mandate of the UN Security Council," CSTO Deputy Secretary General Valery Semerikov told TASS on Tuesday.
"We have created a 3,500-strong contingent. UN observers noted our potential and now they are discussing how our potential can be used. They asked us to create a police peacekeeping unit of about 30-40 people that will be in constant readiness," he said.
"Our peacekeeping forces are ready to operate under the UN mandate, but we are yet to receive it," the official said, adding that the issue still needs to be formally sealed in a proper "regulatory act" with the United Nations.
The CSTO is a post-Soviet security bloc founded in 2002 on the basis of the 1992 Collective Security Treaty. It comprises Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan.