About 50 US and British troops joined more than 1,000 Kazakh service members on Monday for a two-week military exercise, a sign of NATO’s efforts to win clout in Russia’s Central Asian backyard.
The eighth annual “Steppe Eagle” program aims to train Kazakh troops for future deployment with NATO peacekeepers.
“We will leave here better comrades and with our vision for the future reinforced,” Lieutenant General William Webster, commander of US ground forces in Central Asia and the Middle East, said at the opening ceremony.
Kazakhstan, which covers an area five times the size of France, this year holds the rotating chair of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), a European security watchdog that includes NATO countries and Russia.
“As chairman of the OSCE, Kazakhstan has pushed forward issues of enhancing European security, which extend far beyond the boundaries of Europe itself,” said Saken Zhasuzakov, first deputy defense minister and Kazakh armed forces chief of staff.
After the ceremonial raising of the Kazakh, US and British flags at the Ili military range, 50km north of Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty, troops marched past to the accompaniment of music from a 10-person military brass band.
The US is vying with Russia for influence in ex-Soviet Central Asia, a region bordering Afghanistan and Iran that the Kremlin sees as within its sphere of influence.
Washington operates an important air base in neighboring Kyrgyzstan supplying its troops in Afghanistan, and relies on other Central Asia states for ground shipments of supplies.
So far, only small numbers of Kazakhs have participated in non-combat roles in Iraq. British and US servicemen said Kazakh troops were unlikely to be deployed in Afghanistan due to historical links. However, they said future deployments in places like Kosovo, Darfur and Western Sahara would be possible.
The US is represented at the training exercise by around 45 servicemen. Britain sent five participants, and will provide an assessment team to review the Kazakh troops at the end of the exercise.
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
RSS