Islamabad: Pakistan’s armed forces concluded the multinational peacekeeping exercise with the militaries of China, Mongolia and Thailand.
The 10-day long drills featured around 1,000 troops from the four countries. The exercise that concluded on September 15 was held at Chinese People’s Liberation Army training base in Queshan county in the central province of Henan.
The exercise involved infantry, quick reaction forces and helicopters. It also included latest Chinese equipment such as mine-clearing robots and bomb-detecting drones.
The UN Peacekeeping exercise called “Shared Destiny-2021” marked the first multinational peacekeeping exercise hosted by China. The drill was based on a 2016 incident when a Chinese peacekeeping base in Mali came under attack.
The troops practised armed escort, battlefield reconnaissance, vigilance and patrol, protection of civilians, response to violent and terrorist attacks, construction of temporary operating bases, battlefield rescue and epidemic control, covered the main operations of current UN peacekeeping missions.
The exercise was conducted in three stages, independent training for troops, joint drills in mixed training groups, and the training demonstration and observation.
Brigadier Shahid Amir Afsar, Pakistan’s defence attaché to China, said that the actual combat experience shared by China during the exercise was “much valuable to the Pakistani military” personnel. Similar exchanges and cooperation can help Pakistan and other countries improve the ability to perform peacekeeping missions, he said.
“Participation of Pakistani contingent, their level of expertise and Pakistan’s continued large scale contribution to UN peacekeeping operations was greatly appreciated by all participants,” Pakistan military statement said.
Pakistan is one of the longest-serving and largest contributors to UN peacekeeping. Pakistan currently has around 3,800 peacekeepers assigned to different missions as of July 2021. Since 1960, more than 200,000 Pakistani men and women have participated in over 46 UN peace missions in 28 countries. As many as 158 Pakistani peacekeepers lost their lives in the cause of peace. Last week, a Pakistani soldier, Lance Naik Adil Jan, died on a United Nations peacekeeping mission in Darfur, western Sudan.
