SHCHUCHINSK, Kazakhstan, June 9 (UPI) -- Defense ministers of the Confederation of Independent States -- the former Soviet Union -- have gathered in Shchuchinsk, a city in the northern Kazakhstan, to discuss how to prevent Russian surface-to-air portable missile systems from falling into the hands of terrorists.
Speaking from Astana, Kazakhstan's capital, before heading to Shchuchinsk, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov said he wanted an interstate structure to control issues relating to the sale of portable surface-to-air missiles -- or SAMs -- to be created.
"It is necessary to create a mechanism to control the transportation of this dangerous type of weapons abroad," Ivanov said as quoted by the Russian Interfax news agency. "I mean the export and import of mobile surface-to-air missile systems."
The interstate control needed to be established "not only because the threat of such weapons falling into the hands of terrorists is real but also because this is already happening," another Russian news agency, Itar-Tass, which quoted Ivanov.
He said Russia had already raised the issue of control of such weapons shipments abroad.
"This year at the G8 summit in Evian, the G8 leaders also raised this issue, bringing it to an official level," he said.
Ivanov said the Russian SAM system know as Strela was used in the attack on an Israeli civilian aircraft carrying about 300 tourists in Kenya last fall.
The Strela (Arrow) is a light ground-based SAM system. Its main purpose is for close-in troop protection against low-flying aircraft and helicopters.
The Strela 10, for example, code named SA-13 in the United States or Gopher in NATO parlance, can hit airborne targets at ranges up to 5,000 meters (16,500 feet) and at altitudes of 10 meters (33 feet) to 3,500 meters (11,550 feet.)
"Relevant agencies are currently trying to establish from where the Strela in Kenya originated," Ivanov said.
Last year Israel became aware of a request by Syria to Rosoboroneksport -- the federal state unitary enterprise -- for a consignment of other Russian SAM systems, the Igla.
The Igla (Needle), produced by the Open Joint Stock Company V.A. Degtyarev Plant in Russia, ensures that "the missile will hit the most vulnerable components of the target and will allow the effective defeat of modern enemy aircraft and helicopters," the plant says.
The Igla operation is approved for use under conditions of temperate cold, arid and humid tropical climate, according to its producers.
Mike Blair in his article "Do Terrorists Have Sophisticated U.S. Arms?" published by the American Free Press, wrote that three dozen portable surface-to-air missile systems, the Strela and Igla, had been imported into Quebec, Canada, from Colombia, where they had earlier arrived from Eastern Europe.
The missiles are believed to be in terrorist hands and are capable of taking down U.S. commercial airliners, Blair added.
Russians themselves suffered also from their SAM systems.
In May 2002, six Igla systems were confiscated in an arms cache in Chechnya. An MI-8 Russian helicopter that crashed in the Shelkovskoy district of Chechnya in January 2002 could have been hit with a portable SAM system like the Igla or Strela.
Another military helicopter, AN MI-26, was shot down with an Igla missile in Chechnya last August. The crash killed 121.
According to news reports, other helicopters, which crashed in Chechnya, could have also been shot down with SAM systems.
Some Russian newspaper have said that Chechen guerillas could have acquired a large stock of anti-aircraft weapons, most likely the Igla. The Novye Izvestiya newspaper wrote that the weapons could play the same role in Chechnya as they did in Afghanistan in the 1980s, altering the environment in favor of the guerillas against the military.
How did guerillas acquire SAM systems? This is the question being posed by many experts.
It is known that some Russian SAM systems of older design cost only about $500 and can be bought on the black market.
Theft and embezzlement occur at Russian military facilities. Igor Klimov, the acting general director of the anti-aircraft Almaz-Antey facility, initiated three criminal proceedings at three different locations, the Russian Moskovskiy Komsomolets newspaper reported Monday. Klimov was killed last Friday.
Sergey Shchitko, who was the financial director of RATEP, an enterprise from the anti-aircraft facility, was killed 14 hours later. RATEP is located in the city of Serpukhov, not far from the Russian capital, Moscow.
Moskovskiy Komsomolets reported that a naval missile facility is controlled by a regional criminal group.
Tens of millions of dollars were at stake at the RATEP enterprise, the newspaper reported.
The defense ministers -- from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belorussia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan who participated in the meeting in Shchuchinsk Monday -- promised to inform each other about export and import of SAM systems.
