GROZNY. Sept 30 (Interfax-AVN) - The Chechen Interior Ministry's personnel will put on uniforms for the first time in years, acting Chechen Interior Minister Ruslan Alkhanov told Interfax on Thursday.
"Enough uniforms for all the ministry's personnel have reached us," he said
"Police officers have been wearing camouflage uniforms, so people have been complaining that they found it hard to distinguish the police from servicemen or even separatist militants," Alkhanov said.
Not everybody will be willing to walk around in police uniforms, because in Chechnya, this "is unusual and even dangerous," he said.
"But I made it clear that I will get tough, first of all on local police chiefs, if their subordinates do not wear the uniforms," Alkhanov said.
His ministry's in-house security service will strictly enforce the ban on wearing masks in the course of operations, he said.
"People must be sure that a man wearing a mask does not have anything to do with law enforcement agencies and will have the right to act accordingly," Alkhanov said.