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- The U.S.–Russia Joint Commission on POWs/MIAs (USRJC) was established in 1992 by the presidents of the United States and the Russian Federation, George H. W. Bush and Boris Yeltsin. The USRJC was established to determine the fates of the United States's and the Soviet Union's unaccounted-for service personnel from World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War (as defined by the USRJC's directive to be specific "reconnaissance missions"), Afghanistan and the Vietnam War, Laos and Cambodia. Information exchanged between the two parties is then investigated by a spectrum of governmental entities. In the U.S., the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) is the lead agency responsible for personnel accounting. The Commission, holds a formal plenary to discuss a spectrum of issues that involve Prisoners of War and Missing in Action such as; archival research, reported gravesites, loss incident reports, shoot-downs, archival reports, Soviet Bloc nation intelligence and reports, information passed on to the Commission and to establish the direction the USRJC and its Working Groups. Commission Members and researchers interview former military personnel, civilians, former Internees, contract for archival access, research, search military museums and expand the investigative program in an effort to account for missing service members. Joint Commission Support Division (JCSD), Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) provides administrative and analytic support to the U.S. Side of the U.S.–Russia Joint Commission on POW/MIAs (USRJC) and conducts research in Russia on missing U.S. service personnel. JCSD also assists the Government of Russia with efforts to account for its missing. U.S. analysts have had access to many important Russian governmental archives for research on past conflicts including the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defense in Podolsk, Russia—the largest military archive in Europe. After a period of decreased cooperation starting in 2006, U.S. President Obama and Russian President Medvedev revitalized the work of the USRJC in July 2009 with an exchange of Diplomatic Notes reaffirming their respective countries' commitment to strengthening bilateral cooperation on POW/MIA issues. Retired Air Force General Robert H. "Doc" Foglesong has served as Chairman of the U.S. Side since April 2006. The most recent Russian Presidential Decree on the USRJC, issued in July 2014, appointed General-Colonel (retired) as the Chairman of the Commission’s Russian Side and fills other vacant Russian commissioner seats. The USRJC is broken down into four Working Groups which correlate to the four main areas of investigation. There is the World War II Working Group, the Korean War Working Group, the Cold War Working Group and finally, the Vietnam War Working Group, which deals with aspects of the Vietnam War POW/MIA issue. (en)
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