MINSK, July 20. /TASS/. The Belarusian Defense Ministry’s decision to involve fighters of the Wagner private military company (PMC) in training its army personnel aims to raise interoperability and skills of the republic’s armed forces and ensure its security, the Ministry’s press office reported on Thursday.

"All the decisions now made by the leadership of the Defense Ministry pursue one goal: to increase interoperability and skills of units of the armed forces in the interests of ensuring the Belarusian state’s military security," the statement reads.

As the Belarusian Defense Ministry emphasized, "amid the prevailing geopolitical situation, the real combat experience possessed by the Wagner PMC is an opportunity to continue pursuing the course undertaken by the Belarusian army towards its modernization, rearmament and quick introduction of the experience of present-day military conflicts into the training program."

The Belarusian Defense Ministry reported earlier on Thursday that the republic’s special operations forces jointly with Wagner fighters would practice combat training missions at the Brestsky training ground near the Belarusian-Polish border.

Before that, the Belarusian Defense Ministry reported that Wagner fighters were involved in training the personnel of the republic’s Territorial Forces near Osipovichi in the Mogilev Region. Minsk earlier announced that the Belarusian Defense Ministry and the Wagner PMC had worked out a plan of interaction for the immediate future. The Belarusian side did not disclose the number of Wagner fighters who had arrived in the republic.