| Daily Monitor EMMANUEL GYEZAHO |
| KAMPALA Monday, February 19, 2007 advertisements THE Chief of Defence Forces General Aronda Nyakairima will this week announce the date when a battalion of UPDF soldiers is travelling to Somalia on an African Union peacekeeping mission to restore stability.
UPDF Spokesman Maj Felix Kulayigye told Daily Monitor yesterday that Gen Nyakairima would make public the official date on which Ugandan troops would travel to Mogadishu. About 1,500 Ugandan troops are ready for deployment in Mogadishu as overall command of the mission code named AMISON (African Union Mission in Somalia). Maj Gen Levi Karuhanga will head the AU force intended to stabilise the Horn of Africa nation. The Ugandan force will be in charge of Mogadishu while the rest of the African peace keeping force will take over security in the port city of Kismayu and Baidoa, among other trouble spots. Last week, Parliament fulfilled the last constitutional requirement to sanction the deployment of Ugandan troops to a foreign nation by voting on the government resolution to send UPDF peacekeepers to Somalia. It was also revealed that Burundi, a country only waking up from the rubbles of conflict, has committed 1,700 troops to the war ravaged country. Reuters reported that the Burundi army announced yesterday that they would deploy troops to Somalia within days. "Burundi will supply 1,700 troops and the first elements are expected to leave next week," Burundi army spokesman Colonel Adolphe Manirakiza said. |
Source: Daily Monitor, Feb 19, 2007