Deployed soldiers in Lebanon are visited by the Minister of Defense

The Minister with one of the Spanish soldiers (Photo:M.Romero/MDE)

Launch of the anti-tank misile Spike (Photo:M.Romero/MDE)

In Latvia, the Minister joins the table with the soldiers (Photo:M.Romero/MDE)

Spanish soldiers deployed in Lebanon -whose membership belongs to the 6th Brigade "Extremadura"- received a Christmas greeting by the Minister of Defense, María Dolores de Cospedal, who visited them in Lebanon the 27th and 28th of December.

This way, she could know at firsthand the job that the Spanish soldiers carry out in the area, in the base "Miguel de Cervantes" and in detachments where they are deployed too.

Altogether, there are more than 600 effectives, under the command of the NATO (OTAN in Spanish), who are responsible of watching the cessation of hostilities in between Israel and Lebanon, promoting humanitarian aid, facilitating the voluntary return under safe conditions of displaced people, helping the Lebanese Armed Forces to respect the Blue Line, as well as collaborating in order to stop ilegal arm trade.

The current rotation, the 28th, took relay in November and it will be deployed for the next six months under the command of general Romero, who additionally is the chief of the Eastern Sector of the mission.

Increase of the effectives

During her visit, Cospedal announced Spain's intention of increasing its effectives in the missions of Afganistan, Irak and Mali.

This way, in the contingent of Afganistan there will be 95 effectives remaining the current 30; the effective in Irak will be reinforced with 30 members and it will be formed by 480 soldiers; the one in Mali will have a provisional increase of 140, reaching altogether 292 effectives.