Posted on 09/10/2005 8:35:16 AM PDT by LesbianThespianGymnasticMidget
TBILISI (AFP) - A contingent of 558 Georgian troops left for Iraq to relieve fellow soldiers from the South Caucasus country working under the US-led coalition.
The troops departed for the six-month deployment after a formal send-off ceremony near Tbilisi.
They had received two months of training for the deployment from US and Georgian instructors and would get a further two weeks' training in Kuwait, armed forces chief Levan Nikoleishvili said at the ceremony.
This former Soviet republic headed by pro-US President Mikhail Saakashvili sent its first troops to Iraq in August 2003, increasing its presence there to 550 last March.
Georgian troops have recently been providing security at a military base of the US-led coalition forces in Baghdad and have been on patrol in the city of Tikrit.
That's great, but why don't they put them on the border with Chechnya?
Maybe because Russia is illegally occupying parts of their country?
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