MOSCOW. April 30 (Interfax-AVN) - Member-states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) should work out an efficient mechanism of enforcing mutual commitments in the military sphere, Viktor Zavarzin, chairman of the State Duma Defense Committee, said on Friday.
"All CSTO member-states should develop an own mechanism of enforcing military technical cooperation agreements reached. Legislation, regulating such a mechanism, had not been developed yet due to domestic interdepartmental differences," Zavarzin told Interfax-Military News Agency.
Zavarzin emphasized that CSTO member-states did not show due interest in armament modernization and overhaul programs, proposed by Russia within the framework of the Intergovernmental Military Technical Cooperation Commission.
As a positive example of cooperation within the CSTO framework he cited cooperation, pertaining to CSTO infrastructure security (railways, airlines, pipelines, sea routes, largest power plants, etc.), which directly influences all national security components of each member-state.
"For instance, this January the Russian president submitted the bill "On Ratifying the Agreement on Establishing a Single Protection System of Railways of CSTO Member-States" to the State Duma for consideration. The agreement coordinates joint planning in this sphere," he noted.
He said that on the whole there were a number of serious problems and difficulties in each CSTO workstream. Should such problems be solved, the organization could achieve a qualitatively new level of cooperation, and enforce decision, meeting challenges of contemporary military-political environment in CSTO member-states. It is also necessary to refine policy, pertaining to facing contemporary challenges and threats, Zavarzin said.
He said that one of the priorities consisted in establishing contracts between CSTO and UN, and CSTO and OSCE. "The organization may also coordinate its efforts with NATO in the future, first and foremost, in the sphere of combating terrorism, religious extremism, and drug trafficking," he said.
The CSTO comprises the following six states: Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan. The Collective Security Council, incorporating all member-states, is the CSTO main managerial body.