The personnel, all members of the crisis reserve, demonstrated what they had learned at the Rabasaare barracks near Tapa, particularly the use of water cannon.

Two of the cannon used in training had recently been acquired for the civilian Police and Border Guard Board (PPA), supplementing the two that had previously been in use.

Veiko Kommusaar, the PPA's deputy director general for border monitoring, said: "Over the course of this week, we've been able to test and use them on a larger scale and with a larger personnel group. There are no major concerns with them; naturally, some adjustments are always needed."

Kommusaar said water cannon are a vital addition to the crowd control arsenal, particularly in the context of a potential hybrid migration campaign against Estonia similar to those seen on the borders of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.

"Since the main layer of threat has not disappeared from our region – it's been happening from the Belarusian direction for the fourth year already. And it only takes someone to think it's time to direct it this way, and we'll be facing it," Kommusaar said.

The exercises' premise included civilian rioting. Police dogs were also deployed in the training.

Cooperation between the EDF and PPA is helping to support training the basics of suppressing mass riots over a three-year period, and to about a thousand reservists in total. Currently, the crisis reserve consists of a few hundred men.

An additional 1,500 PPA officers will be getting the same training.

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