Ministry of Extraordinary Situations (Russian Federation)

Russian President Boris Yeltsin established the Ministry of the Russian Federation for Affairs for Civil Defence, Emergencies and Elimination of Consequences of Natural Disasters (link=no), also known as The Ministry of Emergency Situations, MChS (link=no), or internationally as EMERCOM (derived from "Emergency Control Ministry") on January 10, 1994. One school of thought traces the origins of the agency to December 27, 1990, when the RSFSR established the Russian Rescue Corps and assigned it the mission of rapid response in the case of emergencies.the Head of Ministry is Vladimir Puchkov, appointed on May 17, 2012, and replacing Sergey Shoygu, the foundational Emergencies Minister who served in the role for sixteen years.HistoryThe history of civil defence services in Russia traces to the years of Muscovy rule and the 1649 "Direction on Municipal rescue" decree of Tsar Alexis of Russia which officially raised the Moscow Municipal Fire Service, the first active fire department in Russia. When Peter the Great was Tsar, Saint Petersburg was given its own fire department modeled on Western practices of the time. By 1863 it was transformed, by orders of Tsar Alexander II of Russia, as the first ever professional fire service in Russia and Eastern Europe.Starting in 1932 civil defense matters were performed by the Local Air Defense Units (Местная противовоздушная оборона PBO-C, Mestnaya protivovozdushnaya oborona PVO-S) under the nascent Soviet Air Defense Forces, which were transferred to the NKVD in 1940 (and served with distinction, together with the NKVD Fire Services Command founded in 1918, in the Great Patriotic War). In 1960 it was returned to the Ministry of Defense as a service branch of the Soviet Armed Forces (the Civil Defence Forces of the Ministry of Defense) and a directly reporting agency, while the MVD retained the firefighting service.