Twelve years of presence and commitment alongside the Iraqi population. The base hit by Iran in Erbil (Italian soldiers unharmed, while a French soldier died) hosts the multi-force contingent of our country as part of theInherent resolve operation. “I think they didn’t want to deliberately target the Italians, but the coalition,” he said Defense Minister Guido Crosetto continues to call for dialogue to put an end to the war in Iran.
Our military, today led by Colonel Stefano Pizzotti, they arrived in Erbil and in other areas of the country responding to the request for help presented on 20 September 2014 by the permanent representative of Iraq to the United Nations. Long the second military presence in the country after the United States and a prestige recognized primarily by the local population, the Italians were called in to ensure security, personnel recovery and training. Since October 2014, with the Prima Parthica operation, named after the Roman legion present in the Middle East at the time of Emperor Septimius Severushelp ensure stability to the whole. The coat of arms they wear on their arms features a centurion of ancient Rome with ithe tricolor cloak that embraces, almost to protect, the flags of Kurdistan and Iraq.
In the most complicated months of 2016, with Daesh still holding Mosul, they had escorted and defended the workers of the Cesena company that had secured the dam in the north of the country, thus averting a humanitarian disaster. Protecting the approximately 1,200 workers from possible ISIS incursions, they allowed the technicians to proceed with the cement injections and maintenance of the shutters securing what is considered the third dam in the Middle East. A flow rate of over ten billion cubic meters of water which risked pouring into an area inhabited by one and a half million people. In the shadow of the airport, Christian Family had been there in the first months of 2016, the Italian presence, discreet and professional, continued to train the police and military forces of the Government of Baghdad to guarantee them the possibility of keeping the country safe.
The Italian trainers of the A&A (Advise and Assist) instruct the Kurdish Zeravani (the Kurdish military police under the control of the Ministry of the Interior of the autonomous region of Kurdistan) both in the use of mortars and in first aid medical proceduresthe recognition of the nuclear, bacteriological and chemical threat, the reading of topographical maps.
