Brussels, 05/07/2004 (Agence Europe) - A NATO fact-finding mission is in Iraq this week to assess the needs and possibilities for training the Iraqi army. The task force, headed by Admiral Gregory Johnson, Commander of the Joint Force Command for Southern Europe (JFC), will be comprised of "up to eight persons" and will remain "no more than five days", a senior NATO official said. The report by these military experts "will be one of the bases for developing options to be submitted to the NATO Council", the same official continued.
The North Atlantic Council (NAC) is expected to decide "as soon as possible" on the arrangements for Alliance assistance to Iraqi security force training, it is said at NATO although no exact date has been given. After the NATO Heads of State and Government pledged at the Istanbul Summit to provide assistance to the Iraqi government "in training its security forces", discussions could prove difficult regarding the interpretation of a number of vague terms in the declaration, between those who support a formal NATO mission in Iraq, with the United States at the fore, and those who support a NATO support role for training missions undertaken individually by the Alliance member nations, a position defended mainly by France.