Posted 27 August 2006 @ 14:22
JAKARTA, 27 August 2006 - Indonesia has not only been making preparation to send troops which will join United Nations peac keeping force in Lebanon but also to deploy a taskforce of the Indonesian Defense Forces (TNI) to continue a peace mission in Congo. The taskforce members that are going to be dispatched to Congo will be recruited from an army engineer detachment, TNI said in a statement made available Saturday.
Indonesia will likely to send 1,000 military personnel to Lebanon and 199 others to Congo, it said, adding that the peace mission in the African state began in 1960. The army engineer detachment has thus been conducting an exercise in Bogor on August 23 until September 12, 2006. The taskforce that will be deployed in Congo under a UN peacekeeping force will replace previous taskforce and leave for the African country late September or early October.
TNI`s participation in a peace mission began in Egypt in 1957. It later sent personnel to Zaire and Congo alike in 1960s. Indonesian military personnel that will be sent to Lebanon namely one mechanical battalion of 850 personnel comprising 15 officials of the TNI headquarters, 576 army troops, 221 marines, and 37 Air Force soldiers. It has also readied 46 armored vehicles, six jeeps, one water tank, 20 trucks, two maintenance vehicles, one back loader, one forklift, 2 ambulances, and one oil tank.
Like Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei Darussalam pledged to dispatch military personnel as well. Malaysia would send 850 to 1.000 military personnel and Brunei 200 to Lebanon whose southern part was devastated by Israeli brutal aggression. The UN Security Council (UNSC) approved recently a resolution which called for a full cessation of hostilities and for Israel to withdraw its troops from Lebanon at the earliest.
|
'Latest news' feed