PRIVATE MILITARY COMPANIES AS A GENERATOR OF THE MERCENARY DEVELOPMENT

This article provides an overview of the phenomenon of the activity of private military companies (PMC) viewed through the lens of mercenary activity, which characterizes the specifics of the operation of these companies and their influence on the process of changing the war methods in the recent period.
With this object in mind, different approaches to the definition of private military company and the best-known PMCs were analyzed, as well as the areas of military conflict in which they were involved and the legal divergences encountered in the process of attempts to regulate their activity.
At the same time, in this research was studied the subject of using mercenary services of the private military companies to cover the possible resolution of particular interests, which may affect the national security of states, on whose territory unfolds armed conflicts.