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“Dragoon Pioneer 2016” Exercise is Over at Negresti (video)



CHISINAU, May 19, 2016 — The closing ceremony of the Moldovan-American exercise “Dragoon Pioneer 2016” was held today at the Engineer Battalion from Negresti, Straseni. The ceremony was attended by President of the Republic of Moldova, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, Nicolae Timofti, Minister of Defense Anatol Salaru, Ambassador of the USA to the Republic of Moldova, James D. Pettit, and military attaches to the Republic of Moldova.

During the event, the Head of the State thanked the American partners for the support offered to our country. As a sign of deep gratitude for contributing to the development of defense cooperation between the Republic of Moldova and the United States of America, Nicolae Timofti awarded State Distinctions: “Military Merit” Medal to Alexander George Deraney, Commander of the Engineer Battalion of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment (USA); “Civic Merit” Medal to Joseph Carlton Bilbo, military attaché of the United States of America to the Republic of Moldova.

Anatol Salaru said that the military exercise “Dragoon Pioneer 2016” will be remembered by National Army and US Army soldiers, but, most importantly, it will be remembered by the Moldovan citizens, as true beneficiaries of the training of 365 engineers. “I say that because throughout 17 days of training, our soldiers learned techniques of finding and disposing of explosives using the US Army EOD vehicles. Why will Moldova’s citizens benefit from it? Because, every day, the National Army engineers are called in different districts of our country to neutralize ammunition discovered by local citizens”, mentioned the Minister of Defense.

The Ambassador of the USA to the Republic of Moldova stated: “The last three weeks’ training was extremely valuable for both armies through joint work in order to improve our ability to cooperate”.

“Dragoon Pioneer 2016” exercise is conducted for the first time in Moldova bringing together 198 soldiers of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment of the US Army and 165 soldiers of the EOD Battalion, the 22nd Peacekeeping Battalion, as well as from Brigades 1, 2, and 3 of the National Army.

During the exercise, the troops used 58 vehicles of the US Army and 40 EOD and supply vehicles of the National Army.

The American EOD vehicles will leave the Republic of Moldova on Friday, May 20, through Leuseni checkpoint. The vehicles will depart from the EOD Battalion in Negresti at 7AM.


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