President Alexander Lukashenko promoted Valentin Agolets from deputy interior minister to the ministry's top post. Vladimir Matskevich, one of several regional security chiefs, will now head the national security service -- still called the KGB in the former Soviet republic.
"Could we have such a celebration two years ago, when security organs were faced with wild slander, especially the KGB?" Lukashenko said at a reception at KGB headquarters.
State television showed him bestowing ceremonial swords to KGB staff. Now, he added, "people respect the state security organs."
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