MOSCOW. Nov 29 (Interfax-AVN) - The Russian Border Guard Service will embrace the all-volunteer force concept in 2008, and will no longer be manned with conscripts, top officials of the Russian Border Guard Service said.
"We conducted our last draft in autumn 2006, which will retired in autumn 2008. From that moment on our service will be manned with volunteers only," Deputy Head of the Russian Border Guard Service Lieutenant General Nikolai Rybalkin said in Moscow on Thursday.
There are no conscripts in border guard units in north-western and western Russia, on the Russian-Kazakh border, and the Central Federal District.
Rybalkin noted that conscripts accounted for only 10% of the border guard force in the North Caucasus.
"The strength of border guards in Chechnya has been halved, since border guard units there are manned with volunteers. There are no conscripts in Chechnya," he emphasized.
The attrition of junior officers in the Russian Border Guard Service has stopped, he noted.
"We have raised the money allowance of officers, serving on Russian borders, and introduced special pay rises, compensations, and payoffs to attract the best personnel," he said.
At the same time he noted that housing remained the most urgent problem facing the Border Guard Service.