Germany offers €500,000 for new Defence School in Georgia

Germany’s top official to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) says his country will allocate half a million Euros to Georgia so it can build a specialist defence school that will offer professional development programmes and quality training to support institutional reforms and good governance of the security sector.

Germany’s Ambassador to NATO Hans-Dieter Lucas said the money will be used to build a new Defence Institution Building (DIB) School, which is an initiative within the NATO-Georgia Substantial Package.

The support package includes a set of 13 capacity building measures aimed at strengthening Georgia’s defence capabilities and advancing the country’s preparation towards NATO membership. 

The Ambassador also announced Germany would send a project coordinator to support the establishment and daily operations of the new school.

The DIB School will be built at the Defence Ministry’s Professional Development Centre, which has provided training courses to hundreds of security professionals since 2012, with NATO support.

According to the NATO webpage the new DIB School will build on training currently offered at the Defence Ministry’s Professional Development Centre, as well as NATO-supported capacity building initiatives such as the NATO-Georgia Professional Development Programme. 

Training modules will focus on effective defence and security management, building integrity and ethics within the Armed Forces, and governance sector reform. 

"Its aim is also to support an inter-agency approach in responding to various security threats and challenges”, said NATO.