MOSCOW, July 03. /ITAR-TASS/. Russia is creating a federal centre to monitor inter-ethnic relations. The duty to draft a system of preventing ethnic conflicts will be the government's competence. The program will be launched by the end of this year, President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday. The system will cover all of the country’s regions.

Speaking at a meeting of the Council on Inter-Ethnic Relations on Thursday Putin said that the federal centre will be coordinating the analytical and pre-emptive activities by bodies of power, research organizations and the expert community and generate recommendations. In particular, measures to prevent extremist outbreaks among school and university students will be enhanced. Putin called for clearly formulating youth policy priorities. They must be geared to shaping a harmonious personality and to bring up a citizen combining love for the home country and the awareness of national and ethnic identities.

Putin recalled that some countries these days were experiencing what he described as erosion of traditional spiritual values.

“We are witnesses to neo-Nazi organizations revive and gain influence in some countries, and ethnic and religious intolerance and calls for violence become the slogan of forces seeking rise to power,” Putin said.