EASBRICOM meets in Kigali

KIGALI - The Police Component of the Eastern African Standby Brigade Coordination Mechanism (EASBRICOM) is meeting in Kigali to evaluate its performance during the just concluded simulation exercise that was held in Djibouti. EASBRICOM comprises of 10 countries and provides the eastern Africa region with appropriate capabilities to prevent and manage conflicts and facilitate rebuilding. It is a unit of the African Standby Force whose intention is to be an African military force, with civilian, police and military components under the African Union. It will be deployed in times of crisis in Africa. “The multinational Eastern Africa Standby Force (EASF) Field Training Exercise began on November 29, 2009 in Djibouti. The historical exercise brought together approximately 1,500 troops, police and civilian staff from 10 countries working side-by-side for the first time,” said the Police Spokesman, Eric Kayiranga. “Senior police officers, who were part of this training, are now meeting in Rwanda to assess setbacks highlighted during the training. This is in line with having a fully-fledged African force and we expect it to be fully operational and ready for deployment by 2015”. He pointed out that currently Rwanda holds the chairmanship of the EASBRIG Police component chaired by Assistant Commissioner, Charles Shema. Commenting on the field training, Kayiranga said that it was an exercise on how the force can handle conflicts and designed to develop multi-dimensional command, control and staff duties, operational capabilities, and broaden the region’s peacekeeping capacity. Meanwhile, Kayiranga said that there is need to show that Africa can work together and demonstrate an ability to move a large force to a mission area. Ends

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EASBRICOM meets in Kigali