MOSCOW, December 22. /TASS/. The Collective Security Treaty Organization’s (CSTO) peacekeeping operation in Kazakhstan showed the readiness of the organization's member states to jointly defend their interests, Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces and First Deputy Defense Minister, said on Thursday.
"At the beginning of this year, a CSTO peacekeeping operation was conducted on the territory of Kazakhstan for the first time. It demonstrated the readiness of the organization's member states to jointly solve tasks and defend their interests. The success of the operation is the result of regular joint training events where counter-terrorism fighting was practiced, as well as interaction when carrying out peacekeeping tasks," he told foreign military attaches at a briefing.
He added that in 2022, joint exercises ‘Rubezh’ with units of the collective forces of the rapid deployment of the Central Asian collective security region were held on the territory of Tajikistan.