On September 8 there started a car-rally dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War and the 25th anniversary of the "Shield and Sword" newspaper. Two  crews -  "West" and "East" - will ride through  City-heroes and  Cities of Military Glory. The end point of the route before returning to Moscow will be the city of Sevastopol.

Crews  of the rally are composed of the staff of the MIA Joint Editorial Board and MIA veterans. This year, the unique action is attended by a representative of the Russian Orthodox Church.

The departure of the crews was attended by fellow reporters, Assistant to the MIA Minister, a member of the Board of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, Chairman of the Russian Council of Veterans of Internal Affairs and the Internal Troops, Colonel-General of Internal Service Ivan Shilov  and a member of the editorial board of the "Shield and Sword" newspaper Metropolitan of Simbirsk  and Novospassk  Theophane.

The action participants will cover several thousand kilometers. On the day of the rally start the "West" crew arrived to the city of Tula, the "East"crew  - to Novomoskovsk.

In the city of  gunsmiths the guests were welcomed by the chief of the MIA Administration for the Tula Region, Sergei Galkin. The meeting participants discussed the role of print and electronic media in covering the activities of law enforcement bodies. After that the members of the "West" crew took part in a solemn meeting and laid flowers at the stele commemorating the Internal Affairs personnel killed in the line of duty. There was also held a meeting with the students of the Cadet Boarding School of the Shchekinsky District where this year there has been created for the first time a profile police class. The program was supplemented by a visit to an art photography exhibition, dedicated  to defenders of the Motherland. The day ended with a "round table", at which the journalists met with readers of the newspaper, current employees and veterans of the Ministry and  participants of the Great Patriotic War.

In Novomoskovsk, the largest industrial city of the Tula Region, the "East" crew members at a meeting with the local police talked about the role of the media, but also received interesting information on the everyday life of the police service, on the changes that occurred after the reform, on new technologies, introduced by the service. Participants of the rally visited the memorial to heroes of the Great Patriotic War where there were buried 165 soldiers and officers who defended the city from the Nazis. Then they took part in a solemn procession along the Alley of Memory of Residents of Novomoskovsk who gave their lives in the peace time during service trips.

At the end of the event of the "West" crew headed from Tula  to Orel, the East" crew "- to Elets.

MIA of Russia Joint Editorial Board