NATO consensus on training

North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) officials have reached a consensus with members to send hundreds of military advisers to Iraq this year to train local security forces. "This process has been more political than practical. We really expect that the training could bring great help to the Iraqi people," NATO spokesman Robert Pszczel told IRIN on Monday from Brussels. A meeting in Romania last week cemented agreement between NATO members while training has already started. At the last meeting on 23 September, Germany and France had opposed participating in the training mission inside Iraq due to security concerns that such a mission could thrust their personnel into a combat role. However, officials participating in the talks said the two nations, as well as Belgium, had received assurances on those concerns and were prepared to drop their opposition and lend their expertise. The organisation will help Iraq establish training, education on human rights laws and the doctrine of command. There will also be a conference next month in Copenhagen, to study the development of this training and get an overall picture of the entire security situation in Iraq. There are now about 50 NATO advisers in Baghdad, working mainly with senior Iraqi generals to establish national military command structures. The US has been focusing largely on training Iraqi combat forces and British trainers have taken a leading role in remoulding Iraqi National Guard soldiers. Hussein Jaber, one of the senior Iraqi generals being trained by NATO, said their experience is helping them create specialised security which can in the near future provide Iraq with an expert force. "NATO is essential for Iraq. We are proud to be trained by them," he told IRIN in Baghdad. More than 300 trainers will begin staffing a new training academy outside Baghdad in the coming months, officials said. They also added that the programme will take place in stages to be followed by several thousand support personnel for logistics, security and communications. "NATO is the main new project for Iraqi development. We really need their help," Raad Bedir, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, told IRIN. According to Pszczel, the NATO mission will come under the command of US Lt-Gen David Petraeus, who is leading the larger effort to train Iraqi security forces. Royal Netherlands Air Force Maj-Gen Karel Hilderink will serve as deputy commander of the force. Bedir said an estimated 100,000 Iraqi security force members had been fully trained and 45,000 more would be ready by the end of January. He added that the government would guarantee secure places for their training, especially for those deployed in the northeast areas of Baghdad. "Iraq can achieve success with the understanding of other European components of NATO. What we can ask for is their help in rebuilding a new progressive Iraq," Bedir added.