MOSCOW. Jan 21 (Interfax-AVN) - The Russian Navy's operational and combat training plans for 2003 include practice of mission accomplishment in the remote oceanic zone, the Defense Ministry press service said on Tuesday.
"The Navy's warships will make voyages to various areas of the World Ocean. During the voyages, Russian military sailors will be perfecting their combat skills, including through conduction of live firing," a press service official told Interfax-Military News Agency.
Much attention will be paid to practicing actions against international terrorism and poaching threats, protection of civil navigation, nipping naval transportation of drugs, and ensuring civilized economic activity. Several warships will make friendly visits to foreign ports.
"There is nothing unusual about it. Russia, just like any other naval power, views permanent presence of its ships in various areas of the World Ocean as one of the most important conditions for ensuring national security and defending national interests, which manifested itself in the main provisions of Russia's naval doctrine approved by the Russian president in 2002," the official said.
A source in the Russian Defense Ministry earlier told Interfax-AVN that a warship unit of the Black Sea Fleet led by the fleet's flagship, the Moskva missile cruiser, is getting ready for a voyage to the Indian Ocean.
"In addition to the Moskva cruiser, the unit will include the Smetlivy guard ship, a large landing craft and auxiliary vessels," the source said.
Vice Admiral Yevgeny Orlov, deputy commander of the fleet, will supervise the voyage.
Preparations for the voyage are already in progress. The tentative date of the ships' departure is February 15. The unit is to stay in the Indian Ocean until June 2003. They are to put in at ports of Djubouti and the United Arab Emirates.
Interfax-AVN earlier reported that a warship detachment of the Russian Pacific Fleet was preparing for a voyage to the Persian Gulf. Large anti-submarine ships Admiral Panteleyev and Marshal Shaposhnikov were getting ready for the combat voyage.
Rear Admiral Valery Agafonov, chief of combat training of the Northern Fleet, told the Krasnaya Zvezda daily that his fleet has begun implementing the combat training plan for 2003.
"By the end of the winter training period, the Northern Fleet will have exercised action of homogeneous groups, in particular, strike and search-and-strike groups. Both submarines and surface ships are in for cruises to various regions of the World Ocean. The ships of the fleet are also likely to pay visits to several foreign ports," Agafonov said.
Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov told reporters on January 15 that "we have serious plans for military training of all services of the Armed Forces, including the Navy." "There are plans to send ships to the Indian Ocean. But the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf are not the same thing," he said.
"This has nothing to do with plans or intentions to conduct or not conduct a military action. It is not related to Iraq at all," Ivanov said.