By Ahmed Elumami,

Tripoli, 28 August 2013:

The Presidency of General Staff has announced that it will send hundreds of soldiers for training abroad as part of plans to rebuild the Libyan armed forces.

"It's been agreed with Italy, Turkey and Britain to train ground army units for three months for each group," spokesman of the Chief of Staff Colonel Ali Shiekhi told the Libya Herald today.

In June this year, when Prime Minister Ali Zeidan attended the G8 summit in Northern Ireland, the US, Italy, France and the UK agreed to train 7,000 Libyan solders as part of plans to rebuild the Libyan Army. Turkey is also involved in the programme. Among the plans, the UK agreed to host 2,000 Libyan personnel on ten-week training courses later this year, to boost the professionalism of the military.
It was later reported that the soldiers would be trained in basic infantry skills and leadership at a British Army location in Cambridgeshire, some 80 kilometres outside London. Personnel who had passed the appropriate medical and physical tests would be sent back to England in small groups once the courses began.

The mechanics of the aid programme were worked out at a meeting in Tripoli at the beginning of this week involving officials from each of the countries.

According to Sheikhi today, each group to be sent abroad would comprise 360 men, both regular army soldiers as well as revolutionaries being incorporated into the armed forces.

The first would be sent to Italy on 27 September, he said, adding that there had been discussions with the governments in Rome, Ankara and London to increase the number of trainees and the length of their courses.

In the meanwhile, revolutionaries will join local training courses in Libya before being sent abroad, Sheikhi added.