Two contingents of Slovenian troops are ready to replace their colleagues in Kosovo and Afghanistan. The ceremony prior to their departure was held in the Franc Rozman Stane barracks in Ljubljana on Friday and the soldiers were assessed as well trained.
According to Colonel Martin Jugovec, head of the Armed Forces Command Centre, the soldiers are ready, pack the best equipment and will be helped by the experiences of their predecessors, whom they will be replacing in late August.
Departing for Kosovo will be a company of 160 troops that will act in the vicinity of the Kosovo town of Pec under the command of Hungarian troops.
The troops, departing for Kosovo on Thursday, will replace the 600 Slovenian soldiers who took part in the KFOR mission in the Serbian province. With the return of the largest Slovenian contingent to date, the shares of Slovenian soldiers will drop from the 11% it was over the last six months to around 5-6%.
According to Defence Ministry State Secretary Franci Znidarsic, the numbers of Slovenia soldiers is planned to increase again in 2011 or 2012.
The eighth contingent of 66 Slovenia troops will meanwhile replace the current 54-strong force in the ISAF mission in Afghanistan. The tasks of the Slovenian troops, stationed near Herat and at the ISAF command centre in Kabul, will be to protect and patrol in the vicinity of the Arena military camp.
The total costs of crisis response operations stood at EUR 52.7m between 2000 and 2006, while the army will this year pay EUR 27.8m.
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