8th ACR EUTM unit in Mali

The Czech Republic has joined the European Union Training Mission (EUTM) in Mali in a bid to support Armed Forces of the Republic of Mali in their effort to suppress insurgents' activities, and deliver additional military equipment. The deployment was passed by both chambers of the Czech Parliament.

8th ACR Task Force EUTM in Mali

While the task of the 1st Czech unit was to guard the EUTM Headquarters in the capital of Bamako in cooperation with Malian and French soldiers, from the 2nd unit the Czechs also train Malian soldiers as instructors.

Commander of the 8th Czech Task Force EUTM assumed the operational task on 9th September 2016 and on 13th March 2017 he handed it over to Commander of the 9th Czech Task Force EUTM.

Czech soldiers closely cooperated with French, German and Mailan soldiers. Four Czech instructors have been training Malian soldiers at the Koulikoro Base (some 50 km of Bamako).

The Czech participation in the mission has originally been planned for 15 months but it has been prolonged to 2017. The size of the unit was 38 soldiers but it could be increased up to 50 personnel. Even though the guard mission has remained the primary one, soldiers escorted military officials travelling out of the Bamako HQ Base, and accompanied convoys of EUTM as well.

Commander:

  • Captain Roman Petr

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Previous units:

Last update: March 14, 2017