MOSCOW, October 21. /TASS/. The joint Russian-Belarusian exercise Zapad-2017 (West-2017) to be held in two years’ time will be aimed, in particular, at improving the efficiency of the unified regional air defense system, Commander of Russia’s Western Military District Anatoly Sidorov said on Wednesday.

"In addition to improving the training of command centers’ personnel and troops, the exercise will be aimed at achieving practical goals - improving the system of management of the regional group of forces, improving the unified systems of surveillance, communications, electronic warfare, raising operational effectiveness and interaction within the existing unified regional air defense system of the countries," he told the joint board of the Russian and Belarusian Defense Ministries.

He noted that during the Union Shield-2015 exercise military units demonstrated a good level of training and cohesion. "The exercise sparked the interest of our "neighbors" to study the focus of troops’ training and the substance of training assignments," he added.

Evaluating the results of the exercise, the commander of the Western Military District noted that the bodies of military control and troops had successfully coped with the tasks.