President Medvedev attends final stage of major war games

The Russian President is visiting the country's Far East, but he is not only meeting officials on the ground – he also attended the East 2010 war games.

Dmitry Medvedev has gone out to sea aboard the heavy missile cruise ship Peter the Great, one of the world's largest naval ships.

Exercises like this one are carried out in the region every two years but this year the scale of the event has become truly spectacular. During the last week 20,000 troops, 2,500 armored vehicles, 70 military planes and helicopters and 30 warships have been practicing technical maneuvers, fire exercises and simulated airborne attacks.

As Russia’s General Chief of Staff General Nikolay Makarov says, these war games are not aimed against any particular country, and have a purely defensive purpose in order to ensure Russia’s national security.