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  • 2016-10-04 (xsd:date)
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  • 40 Million Russians in Drills for Possible Nuclear Strike (en)
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  • On 3 October 2016, alarmist and conspiracy web sites posted stories claiming that 40 million Russian citizens participated in required emergency drills. The sites linked the drills with what they characterized as an imminent threat of a nuclear attack on the United States: Russia is indeed holding a large-scale, three-day disaster drill involving 40 million people starting on 4 October 2016, but nothing in official statements about the drills (at least the ones in English) mention fears of a nuclear strike. According to a bulletin posted on the English-language web site belonging to Russia's Ministry of Emergency Situations, or EMERCOM: According to EMERCOM, the topic of the drill is Organization of civil defense during large natural and man-caused disasters in the Russian Federation. The four-day drill consists of three stages: Stage 1 is dedicated to organization of civil defense actions. Stage 2 is Planning and organization of civil defense actions. Deploying a team of civil defense forces and facilities designed to respond to large disasters and fires. Stage 3 involves Organization of actions of civil defense management bodies and forces for response to large disasters and fires. The notion of widespread drills have predictably caused alarm by some American publications, considering they began the same day Vladimir Putin withdrew from a landmark nuclear security agreement that was entered into as part of the framework for ending the Cold War in 2000: While the idea that millions of Russian citizens and emergency personnel are drilling for a potentially massive disaster might be unsettling to some, we found no indication that the drills are related to anything more specific than the country readying for either a natural or man-made disaster of unknown origins. However, state-run television has sent mixed signals about the drill. RT, which operates an English-language broadcast geared for Western viewers but funded by the Russian government, claims the drills are routine and held yearly since 2012, and that 4 October is the country's Civil Defense Day. RT claims that in 2013, a similar drill was even larger in scale: But Russian citizens were reportedly told on Defence Ministry-run Zvezda TV that Schizophrenics from America are sharpening nuclear weapons for Moscow. Further, the Russian publication Pravda reported that EMERCOM is undertaking a project to build shelters capable of protecting all of Moscow's 12 million residents in case of a nuclear strike. (en)
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