Foreign military staff prepare for winter challenges in Georgia
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21 military staff from NATO-member and partner states are receiving training in Georgia’s winter resort of Bakuriani today.
Under NATO’s Partnership for Peace (PfP) programme, participants from Lithuania, Hungary, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Belarus together with their Georgian partners will go through a three-week training session in Georgia.
Imitating the real challenges under snow with Georgian trainers, they will improve skills in skiing on high mountain slopes, marching in snow and overcoming other possible barriers they may face in the course of official duties.
By defining the safe spots in heavy snow they will learn how to better move across steep cliffs especially when leading the team. Foreign militants will also learn how to erect accommodations under snow and spend a night in an igloo.
At the end of the training the participants will go through tests in technical and physical readiness. Those who successfully pass will be be given certificates, ensigns and a recommendation to move on to the next stage.
PfP is a programme of practical, bilateral cooperation between individual Euro-Atlantic partner countries and NATO, which allows partners to build an individual relationship with NATO, choosing their own priorities for cooperation. Its activities cover different fields of NATO activity including exercises, civil emergency planning and disaster response.
Georgia is among the 22 countries in the programme.
Georgia‘s capital of Tbilisi will host the spring session of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly (NATO PA) this year.
A meeting of the NATO-Georgia Commission on the ministerial defense level has just come to a conclusion in Brussels, where Georgia’s security situation was reviewed and discussed at length.
Georgia’s Foreign Minister Mikheil Janelidze says that 2017 will be a very active year for deepening NATO-Georgia relations.
"Allies are determined to increase and intensify the level of NATO’s support for Georgia,” says Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. "As an aspirant country, Georgia has all the practical tools to prepare for NATO membership."
252 young soldiers have joined the Special Tasks Department of Georgia’s Interior Ministry with a military oath today.
A Turkish military training ship carrying Turkey National Defence University Naval Military Academy students has entered the Poti Sea Port today.
Deputy US Ambassador Elizabeth Rood has visited Bakuriani today to familiarise herself with a winter training course in the eastern, mountainous part of Georgia, involving soldiers from NATO members and ally countries, US and Georgia.