MOSCOW. Aug 10 (Interfax) - Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev has called the police understaffing "critical" and urged personnel to minimize associated risks.
"There is very serious understaffing. I would even call it critical. Five thousand police officers quit last month. This is a difficult situation," the ministry's press center quoted Kolokoltsev as saying at a meeting where police chiefs of the Magadan region and Sevastopol were introduced to personnel.
Police departments "must do everything to minimize such risks," he said.
"I understand that understaffing puts a colossal burden on personnel. But this is when we 'fight not by number but by skill'," Kolokoltsev said.