Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Chi Vinh, Deputy Defense Minister, Head of the Defense Steering Board for Vietnam’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations, and Canadian Ambassador to Vietnam Deborah Paul co-chaired the opening ceremony.
Present at the event were also representatives of the embassies and defense attaché offices of countries that have sent their officers to the course.
Addressing the opening ceremony, General Vinh stressed that Vietnam has been honored in coordination with Canada, a country with a high profile on UN peacekeeping operations, to host the UN training course.
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Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Chi Vinh addresses the opening ceremony of the course. |
On behalf of the Vietnamese Government, General Vinh thanked Canada and other countries for their effective support and assistance for Vietnam in the sphere of UN peacekeeping operations.
The Vietnamese Deputy Defense Minister stressed that the course that have drawn the participation of trainers and trainees from various countries can be seen as a symbol of Vietnam’s good multilateral relations with other countries in the world, particularly in the field of UN peacekeeping operations. He also hoped that Vietnam would host more UN training courses with the enrollment of officers from various countries, contributing to strengthening UN peacekeeping operations.
Major General Hoang Kim Phung, Chief of the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations, said that it is the first in-depth training course for UN logistics peacekeepers Vietnam and Canada have co-held in Vietnam, and that Vietnam, in collaboration with its partners, has so far hosted 12 in-depth training courses for UN peacekeepers.
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Participants and delegates in a joint photo |
In her speech at the event, Canadian Ambassador Deborah Paul hoped that the co-organization of the UN training course would open a new opportunity for the two countries to boost bilateral cooperation.
According to delegates at the event, the training course will provide basic expertise and knowledge of UN logistics for trainees from Vietnam and other member countries of the Military Training Cooperation Program to join UN peacekeeping missions as UN logistics officers or UN equipment staff officers.
Apart from theoretical classes, the trainees will also practice doing duties of UN logistics officers, including negotiating a memorandum of understanding between the UN and a participating country on the contribution of force and equipment to a UN peacekeeping mission, making plans and reports on logistic and technical supplies as well as compensation in accordance with the deals between the UN and a participating country, and doing a general exercise on logistic and technical supplies for a UN peacekeeping mission.
The training course, which is conducted by five instructors from Canada and Sierra Leone and two from Vietnam, and enrolled in by 28 officers, 15 international ones and 13 Vietnamese.
Translated by Thu Nguyen