MOSCOW, July 16 (AVN) - As many as 187,955 people were recruited to the Armed Forces during the sping draft, a spokesman for the Defence Ministry told the Military News Agency on Monday.
The Armed Forces are working to increase the share of professional servicemen in units and formations that accomplish peacekeeping missions in trouble spots and Chechnya. The unified federal group in the North Caucasus had nine percent of professional servicemen in October 1999 while a year later there were 38 percent of them. Currently the rate decreased down to 28.5 percent due to various reasons, primarily financial ones.
The Defence Ministry never prevented and never will prevent introduction of alternative civil service in Russia, Colonel General Vladislav Putilin, chief of the ministry's main mobilisation department, said. Though the only key condition should be made - the tensity of the alternative service must be close to that of the regular military service, he said.
According to Putilin, draftees can be sent to accomplish missions in military conflict environment, which means to participate in combat operations, only six months after the draft and corresponding training on their military profession.