MOSCOW, June 9. /TASS/. The Northern Fleet’s search and strike group kicked off drills in the Barents Sea to search for and eliminate a notional enemy’s nuclear-powered submarine, the Fleet’s press office reported on Tuesday.

"The drills are running at the Fleet’s combat training naval ranges. One of the multi-purpose nuclear-powered submarines is acting against the surface forces. Its crew faces the opposite tasks: an attack by a group of a notional enemy’s surface ships," the press office said in a statement.

The Fleet’s hunter-killer force comprises the small anti-submarine warfare ships Brest, Snezhnogorsk and Yunga. They are supported by Il-38 anti-submarine warfare aircraft from the air.

"The ships’ crews are practicing joint maneuvering and searching for a nuclear-powered submarine, dodging a torpedo attack and delivering a retaliatory strike. At the final stage of the drills, the anti-submarine warfare force will accomplish combat exercises with torpedo weapons," the statement reads.

The Northern Fleet’s maneuvers are running as part of large-scale drills of all-arms force groupings to defend sea lanes in the Arctic against a potential enemy’s attack. At various stages of the naval exercise, up to 20 warships, submarines and support vessels are accomplishing tasks in the Barents Sea.

The drills will run amid the deployment of the French Navy’s guided missile frigate Aquitaine to the Barents Sea on June 5. Russia’s National Defense Control Center earlier announced that the Northern Fleet’s forces were tracking the movements of the French frigate in the Barents Sea.