Internal Troops
Identification and Jurisdiction
The entities listed—the Internal Troops Headquarters at 4 Gorodskoy Val Street, the 6th Separate Special Police Brigade (military unit 5525), and the Internal Troops Training Center (military unit 5448)—belong to the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Belarus. These forces are a militarized internal security formation subordinate to the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) and are distinct from the Armed Forces of Belarus. Their core missions are defined by Belarusian law and ministerial regulations governing policing and internal security.
Headquarters: Location and Command Role
Headquarters is located at 4 Gorodskoy Val Street, Minsk, a central address that houses the Ministry of Internal Affairs’ central apparatus. The Internal Troops’ command staff is co-located there, providing force-wide command and control, operations planning, personnel management, logistics oversight, and interagency liaison. The site functions as the strategic and administrative center for Internal Troops activities nationwide. Detailed internal layouts, security features, and communications systems for this facility are not publicly disclosed.
Commander
Major General Nikolay Karpenkov serves as Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs and Commander of the Internal Troops, a role he has held since late 2020 according to official decrees and public reporting. In this capacity, he exercises operational and administrative control over Internal Troops formations and reports to the Minister of Internal Affairs. He has been designated under sanctions regimes by the European Union, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada, with public listings citing his role in internal security operations during 2020–2021. Specific biographical and personnel file details beyond publicly released information are not provided here.
6th Separate Special Police Brigade (military unit 5525)
The 6th Separate Special Police Brigade (voinskaya chast 5525) is a brigade-level formation of the Internal Troops. As a “separate” formation, it is directly subordinated to higher command rather than being nested within a divisional structure. Its mandated functions align with those of Belarusian special police brigades: maintaining public order, conducting crowd and riot control, reinforcing territorial police units, and protecting critical state facilities. The unit’s administrative number (5525) serves as its formal identifier for official correspondence and record-keeping. Detailed order of battle, strength, subunit composition, and permanent garrison details are not publicly released.
Internal Troops Training Center (military unit 5448)
The Internal Troops Training Center (voinskaya chast 5448) is the principal institution for initial and advanced training of Internal Troops personnel. It conducts basic military training for conscripts and contract servicemembers assigned to Internal Troops units, leader development courses for noncommissioned officers, and specialized instruction in firearms proficiency, convoy and guard operations, crowd-control tactics, urban operations, tactical medicine, communications, and driver training. The center’s course schedules, throughput, and facility layouts (ranges, urban training areas, and auxiliary infrastructure) are not comprehensively disclosed in the public domain.
Missions and Legal Authorities
Internal Troops missions include: maintaining public order and public safety; protecting critical state facilities and designated infrastructure; convoying detainees and prisoners and securing detention facilities; supporting authorities during states of emergency and other special legal regimes; assisting in territorial defense tasks as assigned; and supporting counterterrorism and high-risk policing operations led by competent agencies. These activities are regulated by Belarusian legislation governing internal security and policing. Specific operational rules of engagement and internal directives are not publicly available.
Equipment and Mobility Profile
Internal Troops units are equipped for both policing and militarized internal security tasks. Documented equipment in the force includes 5.45×39 mm Kalashnikov-pattern rifles (e.g., AK-74 family), light machine guns (RPK-74), general-purpose machine guns (e.g., PKM), designated marksman rifles (e.g., SVD), and an array of non-lethal systems (tear agents, stun munitions, rubber rounds) where authorized. Protective gear includes riot helmets, shields, and body armor. Mobility is provided by buses and medium/heavy trucks (e.g., MAZ and Ural families), specialized riot-control vehicles (including water cannons), and armored personnel carriers in the BTR-70/80 series documented within Internal Troops service. Exact holdings and distribution for military units 5525 and 5448 are not publicly disclosed.
Interagency Coordination
The Internal Troops coordinate closely with territorial police directorates and OMON (Special Purpose Police Units) under the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and they may support operations with other state security bodies (e.g., the State Security Committee) when directed. For contingency planning and certain security tasks, coordination with the Armed Forces of Belarus and other ministries is conducted under established national procedures. Specific joint operational plans and communications protocols are not public.
Recent Publicly Reported Activity (2020–2024)
Public reporting shows prominent Internal Troops deployments for nationwide public order operations in 2020–2021, followed by recurrent training cycles, readiness inspections, and security duties around state facilities and large public events in subsequent years. These activities are consistent with the force’s statutory missions. Verified, detailed records of unit-by-unit movements, readiness rates, and alert rosters are not released in the public domain.
Nomenclature and Unit Designations
The numeric identifiers “military unit 5525” and “military unit 5448” are administrative designations (voinskaya chast numbers) used for official documentation and identification within Belarusian state institutions. Such numbers are widely used across post-Soviet security institutions for unit-level administration and do not by themselves disclose operational details such as manning, structure, or precise location.
Information Availability and Limitations
Exact personnel strength, detailed tables of organization and equipment, precise garrison addresses for unit 5525 and unit 5448, internal facility layouts, secure communications systems, guard schedules, and response plans are not publicly available and are likely classified. Accordingly, those details are not provided. This analysis is limited to verifiable, open-source–identifiable facts: institutional affiliation, roles and missions, the headquarters address at 4 Gorodskoy Val Street in Minsk, the commander’s identity and function, and unit designations for the listed brigade and training center.