2017 may be declared the Year of Homeland Defenders in the CIS

The respective Decision was drafted at a meeting of experts on 3-5 September in Minsk. The idea is to implement at national and Commonwealth levels a number of initiatives to raise awareness among the population about the value of military service and cultivate respect towards generations of defenders of homeland.

The CIS traditionally nominates every calendar year to mark socially important aspects of common history or crucial spheres of life in the Member Nations to raise public awareness to these matters.

The draft Decision on declaring 2017 the Year of Homeland Defenders may be put to the agenda of the Council of Heads of State as early as 2014.