| ||
| ||
| ||
 |
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
U.S. joins Morocco medical exercise
From CNN's Al Goodman
ER RACHIDIA, Morocco (CNN) -- U.S. military troops are conducting joint medical training with Moroccan troops in the largest-ever exercise of its kind between the two nations. The training, which does not involve live fire, comes four months after radical Islamic suicide bombers killed 33 people in Casablanca. Instead, it consists of hospital surgeries and medical and dental care for residents of villages located hundreds of miles east of Casablanca. U.S. and Moroccan medical troops have treated more than 3,800 Moroccans since the exercise started on September 6, U.S. Navy spokesman Lt. Corey Barker told CNN. The mission runs until September 20. The exercise, dubbed Medflag 2003, was planned long before the May 16 Casablanca bombings, when a dozen suicide bombers killed 33 people in a series of coordinated attacks in Morocco's largest city. The bombers were also killed. The attack sent a shudder through the country, which is considered a moderate Muslim state. Since then, Moroccan police are reported to have arrested 900 people on suspicion of ties to Islamic terrorists. Last week, a Moroccan court sentenced 27 people to jail for their roles in the Casablanca bombings. The joint medical training -- which rotates annually among African nations -- this year involves about 100 troops from the U.S. Navy, Air Force and Army, along with about 100 Moroccan medical troops. "Medflag 2003 reinforces the United States' commitment to cooperation, stability and inter-operability in the region," a U.S. Navy statement said. The U.S. troops have worked with Moroccan doctors at a hospital in Er Rachidia, 550 kilometers (340 miles) southeast of Casablanca, to perform 196 surgeries. The U.S. and Moroccan medical troops have also dispensed medical, dental and vision care to various villages located 65 km to 120 km from Er Rachidia, Barker said. The U.S. military is distributing $2.5 million in medical supplies during the exercise. Much of it was left over from the field hospital at U.S. Naval Station Rota in southern Spain, which treated 2,700 U.S. troops, mainly from the war in Iraq but also from Afghanistan, said Barker, who is based at Rota. The Rota station, a Spanish naval base where about 3,000 U.S. troops are stationed, was the staging ground for this year's Medflag operation. Previous Medflag exercises sent U.S. medical troops to Uganda in 2002, Mozambique in 2001 and Tanzania in 2000, Barker said. Aside from troops based at Rota, other U.S. troops participating in the exercise have come from the U.S. naval medical centers in Bethesda, Md., and San Diego, Calif.; the Ohio National Guard, the U.S. Naval Dental Center in Naples, Italy and the U.S. Army medical company at Landstuhl, Germany, Barker said. The exercise also will involve a disaster response drill with mock mass casualties, scheduled for Thursday. "This is to allow the Moroccans to get used to working with us, and for us to get used to working with them, in case of major disasters," Barker said.
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
