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China to send anti-riot peacekeepers to Haiti
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2004-06-05 09:08
China kicked off a three-month training for 148 anti-riot policemen on
Friday, and will select 125 to compose its first team of anti-riot peacekeepers
for missions in Haiti, according to the Ministry of Public Security.
A policeman attends
the training session in Beijing June 3, 2004.
[newsphoto] | Vice Minister Meng Hongwei said
Friday at the training's opening ceremony that the anti-riot peacekeeping team
would help maintain local public security order and handle possible social
turbulence, which would require rigid and higher standards in skills and
disciplines than a common peacekeeping police.
The team will head for Haiti in early September this year and stay there for
about six months.
"China's active involvement in peacekeeping missions of the United Nations,
especially in Haiti which has not set up a diplomatic relationship with China,
fully exhibits a peace-loving and responsible image of the country," Meng said.
According to him, the 148 trainees, including 13 females, come from Beijing,
Tianjin, Shanghai and Chongqing municipalities and are aged 28 on average, with
the oldest up to 41 and the youngest only 22.
From the Tianjin anti-riot squadron, Yang Yunsheng, 41, was quite confident
in fulfilling the training. "We will cooperate and train hard to build a
powerful force with tenacious style, adept skills and strict disciplines," Yang
said in his oath.
Female trainee Han Yiqiu said her major goal was to build up her physical
strength so that she could get qualified for the mission when the training
ended.
The organization of an anti-riot team with international working experience
could not only boost the government's cause of promoting peace and stability in
the world, but also benefit domestic public order, especially the security
defense work for the 2008 Olympic Games to be held in Beijing, Meng
acknowledged.
Since 1999, the Chinese government has sent 253 police to participate in UN
peacekeeping missions, including operations in East Timor, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Liberia, Afghanistan, Kosovo and Haiti. Currently, 55 policemen are still left
in these areas for peacekeeping tasks.
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