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Putin to chair summit of post-Soviet security bloc CSTO

Participants in the meeting will discuss allied interaction within the organisation and further efforts to improve the efficiency of the CSTO

MOSCOW, December 2. /TASS/. On Wednesday, December 2, Russian President Vladimir Putin will chair a meeting of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO)’s Collective Security Council via videoconference, the Kremlin press service said.

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"Participants in the meeting will discuss allied interaction within the organisation and further efforts to improve the efficiency of the CSTO. They will also exchange opinions on current issues of international and regional security," the Kremlin said in a statement.

"The key decisions of the session participants will be reflected in a final declaration and other documents," the statement reads.

Russian top diplomat Sergey Lavrov said at a meeting of the CSTO Council of Foreign Ministers on Tuesday that a package of documents aimed at improving the peacekeeping capacity of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) has been prepared for the upcoming meeting of the CSTO Collective Security Council.

Russia holds the organization’s rotating presidency this year, and will hand it over to Tajikistan in 2021.

Currently, six countries form the CSTO: Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. In 2013, the lower chamber of the Serbian parliament, the lower chamber of the Afghan parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union of Belarus and Russia received the status of observer with the CSTO Parliamentary Assembly. On November 6, 2014, the CSTO Parliamentary Assembly invited the parliaments of China, India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan to take part in the organization’s activity as observers.

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Ex-UK Labor party leader wants PM to clarify situation with Storm Shadow missiles

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Romanian presidential candidate vows to end military aid to Ukraine

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