MOSCOW, September 21. /TASS/. About 60 Ilyushin Il-76 military transport planes have been moved to operational airfields as part of the Kavkaz (or Caucasus) 2020 military exercise that kicked off on Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement.

"The flights were carried out from the planes’ home airfields in the Tver, Pskov, Orenburg, Ulyanovsk and Rostov regions. About 60 Il-76 military transport aircraft have been moved," the statement reads.

According to the Defense Ministry, the distance of the flights was up to 2,000 kilometers.

The Kavkaz-2020 drills, led by Chief of the General Staff Army General Valery Gerasimov, are taking place in Russia’s Southern Military District and in the Black and Caspian Seas. The exercise involves about 80,000 personnel, including officers of the Russian Emergencies Ministry and the Russian Guard, as well as up to 1,000 troops from Armenia, Belarus, China, Iran, Myanmar and Pakistan. About 12,900 troops are going to take part in activities covered by the 2011 Vienna Document of the Negotiations on Confidence-and Security-Building Measures.