Posted on 02/03/2003 5:09:43 AM PST by maquiladora
BUDAPEST, Feb 3 (AFP) - US officials said they had begun Monday training Iraqi exiles at a base in Hungary to work with US troops in case of a war in Iraq.
"Their training started today. The volunteers will be trained in a variety of important and necessary skills in support of the coalition forces in the event of a potential war with Iraq," US Major Robert Stern told AFP by telphone from the Taszar military base, some 200 kilometers (120 miles) south of the capital Budapest.
Hungary is allowing the United States to train up to 3,000 Iraqi exiles at the base.
The training is to be in two maximum 90-day sessions under an accord between the Hungarian and US governments, Stern said.
He said the US government was acting under the Iraqi Liberation Act passed by the US Congress in 1997, which allocated up to 97 million dollars for training and equipping Iraqi opposition groups.
The training will be in two parts, with the first phase focusing on basic skills such as self-defense, the law of armed conflict including the Geneva Conventions, human rights, rules of engagement and ethical decision-making, Stern said.
He said the second phase would focus on civilian-military operations, "involving the education of the volunteers in how to work with national and international, private and voluntary humanitarian relief agencies and how to deal with displaced citizens."
Stern said the major role of the Iraqis would "be to facilitate communication between the coalition forces and private volunteer organisations that may come to Iraq."
The first group of exiles to be trained, "a few dozen" according to Hungarian defense sources, arrived in Taszar last week.
More volunteers, selected by Iraqi opposition groups in various countries of the world and screened by the US government, were expected, Stern said.
"The voluteers will be arriving troughout this training program. They will be coming and going in and out of Taszar," said Stern.
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