Military

SHAPE News Morning Update

30 March 2004

NATO

• President Bush welcomed seven former Soviet-dominated nations into NATO as “full and equal partners” on Monday and said the Western alliance was stronger because of their presence. The new members will take part in their first meeting on Friday in Brussels. Three other nations - Albania, Croatia and Macedonia (sic) - still hope to join. NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told reporters also on Monday in Washington that fighter planes would begin “air policing” over the Baltic states the moment their NATO membership took effect, and that he explained the policy to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov two weeks ago. “I think that the Russian Federation has very well understood that NATO has, of course, no ulterior motives by air-policing its airspace,” Mr. de Hoop Scheffer said, adding that NATO has a solid relationship with Russia. “I think that NATO and Russia will further build on this partnership,” he added. (AP 292131 Mar 04)
  
  
• The Belgian government announced that it will send four F-16s to the Baltics to guard the airspace of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, which joined the military alliance on Monday. The government said the planes will be operational as of April and will be based in the military base of Siauliai in Lithuania. (AP 291502 Mar 04)

AFGHANISTAN

• Britain might send more troops to Afghanistan to bolster NATO-led operations there in the coming months, the Ministry of Defence said on Tuesday in London. A ministry spokesman said about 490 British troops were already there, but declined to comment on a report in The Times newspaper that “a few more hundred” would be sent to bolster a provisional reconstruction team in the north. (Reuters 292349 GMT Mar 04)
  
  
• Spain will double its peacekeeping contingent in Afghanistan to 250 soldiers this summer, an aide to the future defense minister said Monday as the incoming Socialist party stood firm on its plans to remove Spain’s troops from Iraq unless the UN takes charge. Outgoing Defense Minister Federico Trillo made the decision on the Afghanistan troops last week in consultation with his Socialist replacement, Jose Bono, according to Bono spokesman Jose Luis Fernandez. (AP 291953 Mar 04)

IRAQ

• The head of a UN team said Monday that better security in Iraq is vital for elections to take place by a Jan. 31 deadline. Also on Monday, in Washington, NATO’s most senior civilian official said the alliance might be willing to command part of an international security force for Iraq if the UN Security Council were to authorize it. NATO Secretary-General de Hoop Scheffer said NATO might get involved if the Security Council passed a resolution and if the governing body that takes political control in Iraq from the United States on June 30 asked for troops. (AP 292149 Mar 04)
  
  
• Members of the UN Security Council are working on authorising a multinational force to help bolster security for an elected government in Iraq, Secretary-General Kofi Annan was quoted as saying. “My impression is that they are working for a multinational force, under a unified command, which would cooperate with the sovereign government of Iraq and contribute to the security of the country,” Mr. Annan told Italy’s Corriere della Sera newspaper. (Reuters 292114 GMT Mar 04)

TERRORISM

• Uzbekistan has launched a massive hunt for suspects after two women set off bombs at a children’s store and bus stop in the capital. President Islam Karimov blamed Islamic extremists for the violence Sunday and Monday and said several arrests were made already. He said backing for the attacks might have come from a banned radical group that has never before been linked to terrorist acts, Hizb ut-Tahrir. The U.S. Embassy in Tashkent warned that “other terrorists are believed still at large and may be attempting additional attacks.” The U.S. has hundreds of troops in Uzbekistan at a tightly secured military base near the Afghan border. (AP 300300 Mar 04)