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14/01/2009
More Troops For Chad
Around 400 soldiers bound for Chad went on parade today.
The contingent, drawn mostly from the 2nd Eastern Brigade with barracks in Dublin, Dundalk and Gormanstown will serve for four months in Goz Beida in the eastern part of the central African country.
Defence Minister Willie O'Dea and Defence Forces Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Dermot Earley reviewed the battalion today in a march past at McKee Barracks.
Commanded by Lt Col Joe McDonagh, they have just completed "an arduous period of training designed to prepare them for the challenges they may encounter in Chad for a four-month tour of duty," a Defence Forces spokesman said.
This included a large-scale exercise in the Glen of Imaal in Co Wicklow, where all troops, weapons and skills were tested.
"The 99th Infantry Battalion are undertaking a difficult mission in an extreme environment, a prospect every soldier relishes and one for which they are well equipped and prepared for," the spokesman added.
The soldiers main task is humanitarian: protecting more than 100,000 refugees and displaced persons in camps as well as protecting aid workers from bandits and rebel groups in an operational area the size of Munster, Leinster and Connacht combined.
The soldiers, in their Mowag armoured personnel carriers, have trained to cope with any possible threat from militia groups.
(BMcC/JM)
The contingent, drawn mostly from the 2nd Eastern Brigade with barracks in Dublin, Dundalk and Gormanstown will serve for four months in Goz Beida in the eastern part of the central African country.
Defence Minister Willie O'Dea and Defence Forces Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Dermot Earley reviewed the battalion today in a march past at McKee Barracks.
Commanded by Lt Col Joe McDonagh, they have just completed "an arduous period of training designed to prepare them for the challenges they may encounter in Chad for a four-month tour of duty," a Defence Forces spokesman said.
This included a large-scale exercise in the Glen of Imaal in Co Wicklow, where all troops, weapons and skills were tested.
"The 99th Infantry Battalion are undertaking a difficult mission in an extreme environment, a prospect every soldier relishes and one for which they are well equipped and prepared for," the spokesman added.
The soldiers main task is humanitarian: protecting more than 100,000 refugees and displaced persons in camps as well as protecting aid workers from bandits and rebel groups in an operational area the size of Munster, Leinster and Connacht combined.
The soldiers, in their Mowag armoured personnel carriers, have trained to cope with any possible threat from militia groups.
(BMcC/JM)
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