“U.S. personnel are just part of the multinational team of instructors and the report that 123 U.S. trainers had traveled to Turkey last week is both unfounded and erroneous,” Pentagon spokeswoman Elissa Smith said in response to an Anadolu Agency inquiry.
Multiple reports claimed Washington sent the soldiers and additional arms to Washington’s airbase in Incirlik, Turkey, and the Kirsehir military base in Hirfanli for a planned train and equip mission for Syria’s rebels.
Washington and Ankara agreed to the mission in February, but training has yet to begin.
“A number of coalition personnel have already been deployed to the training sites to prepare for the arrival of the Syrian volunteers,” Smith said. “For operational security reasons we will not release the training locations or the composition of the multinational training team.”
www.aa.com.tr
1/5/15
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Turkey, US to start train-and-equip plan for Syria rebels May 9: Ankara...
ReplyDeleteThe latest U.S.-led plan to train and arm a Syrian opposition force will start in Turkey on May 9, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told a Turkish newspaper.
The program to train and arm a force that is expected to eventually total more than 15,000 troops has been mired in delays as many details of the plan, such as whether or how Washington would come to their aid on the battlefield, remain unclear. A rebel commander last month told Reuters he expected the training to start in July.
On Friday Cavusoglu told Turkish daily Sabah that the U.S. and Turkey share the view of a Syria without President Bashar Assad.
"There isn't any political or other issue. At first, 300 people will be trained, followed by the next 300 and, at the end of the year, the number of trained and equipped fighters will reach 2,000," he said.
Rebel groups have already been receiving weapons and training from a CIA-led program that Washington has never acknowledged. The new program is under the direction of the Defense Department....dailystar.com.lb
2/5/15