On September 25, 2020, Gp Capt Uditha Piyasena, accompanied by an Embassy interpreter, attended the largest event of the combat training of the Russian Armed Forces of the year, the Strategic Command Post Exercise Caucasus-2020 (“KAVKAZ-2020”), held in the Southern Military District. 

As part of the international group of Defence attaches from 70 countries, en route to the training ground Kapustin Yar in Astrakhan region, Gp Capt Uditha Piyasena first visited the city of Volgograd, where the bloodiest battle of World War II took place, known as the Battle of Stalingrad. Sri Lanka representative paid tribute to the memory of the fallen heroes at the impressive memorial on Mamayev Kurgan (“Motherland calls”).The Exercise was attended by the Russian President Vladimir Putin, and followed by a briefing of the Chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, General of the Army Valery Gerasimov, who stressed that the maneuvers were purely defensive in nature.

During a short interview to some of the journalist present at the venue, made, on the request of the RF MoD media unit, which was broadcasted on Channel One of Russia, the leading TV channel with a multimillion audience, Gp Capt. Piyasena expressed his brief views about the exercise.