MOSCOW, November 28. /TASS/. Russia may supply CSTO member states with modern weapons, the EU is preparing at least three new sanctions packages against Russia in 2026, and Donald Trump intends to bar South Africa from the 2026 G20 summit amid escalating political tensions. These stories topped Friday’s newspaper headlines across Russia.
Speaking at the CSTO summit in Bishkek on November 27, Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed launching a large-scale program to equip the Collective Forces of the CSTO with Russian weaponry. Experts told Izvestia that such an initiative is particularly relevant for several member states, including Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. Participants in the summit adopted a final declaration outlining unified positions on key issues of the international and regional agenda. Among the central topics of the meeting were countering extremism, terrorism, and external threats.
During his address, Vladimir Putin proposed initiating a broad program to equip the CSTO Collective Forces with Russian weapons systems that have "proven their effectiveness in the course of real combat operations."
"Right now, member states of the organization have vastly different and sometimes outdated armaments, in part inherited from the Soviet period. Of course, Kazakhstan and Belarus are the more actively modernized states, but Tajikistan or Kyrgyzstan, as well as Armenia to some extent, clearly experience shortages of modern communications systems, reconnaissance capabilities, counterterrorism equipment, and unmanned aerial vehicles," research fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Darya Saprynskaya told Izvestia.
