Oleksandr Turchynov: Armed criminals must know and understand: when “KORD” operates, they have two choices – to surrender or to die

The main task and responsibility of the state is the reliable protection of its citizens. To ensure this task, special purpose squad "KORD" was created, and it has rightly become the new elite police unit.

This was stated by Secretary of the National Security and Defense of Ukraine Oleksandr Turchynov during his visit to the Training center for policemen of special purpose squad "KORD" (Vita Poshtova village, Kyiv-Sviatoshyn district of Kyiv region).

In his speech, Mr. Turchynov noticed that under Russian aggression that threatens the whole European continent, "our common goal is to build a strong national state which will force to reckon with it, will manage to stop the aggression and to clear its territory". He also noted that "armed organized crime is raising head" inside the country.

"Every citizen of our country must feel safe and confident, - Secretary of the NSDC of Ukraine added. - Only a strong national state will ensure sustainable socio-economic development and reliable protection against external and internal enemies".

Oleksandr Turchynov congratulated the graduates on successful completion of special training courses. "Armed criminals must know and understand: when "KORD" operates, they have two choices - to surrender or to die", - he stated.

On Friday, in the Training center, the graduation ceremony of policemen of special purpose squad "KORD" who were sent to study from different regions of Ukraine, took place. The training was conducted by the method of preparing the US Administration SWAT on drug fight, the US Border Patrol Special Operations Group, "Texas Rangers" division, the US Marshals Service, and with the support of the US Government.

From January 10, 2016, till now, 276 police departments of special purpose have been prepared; they continued to serve at the National Police Main Departments in Kyiv city, Kyiv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Sumy, Zhytomyr, Rivne, Donetsk, Chernivtsi, Zakarpattya, Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson, and Mykolaiv regions.

Today, in the Training center, Secretary of the NDSC of Ukraine Oleksandr Turchynov, Minister of Internal Affairs Arsen Avakov and US Ambassador Marie Jovanovich opened an object which has no analogs in Ukraine - a shoot-house - a building designed to prepare law enforcement officers for conditions of close firefight in the premises located in residential or industrial areas, in order to work out getting access to premises and clearing them during special operations. The object was constructed by the examples and based on the experience of construction of similar premises for training the best special purpose police units of foreign states.

Its distinctive feature is that for the first time, special purpose officers of the National Police of Ukraine will be able to work out group methods of indoor tactics using short-barreled and long-barreled weapons. Unlike conventional shooting ranges, policemen are able to fire not in a single but in several directions simultaneously during trainings, which enables to bring trainings closer to real-life combat conditions for the release of premises from armed criminals, working out exercises in freeing hostages.