NATO Accreditation and Attachés’ Visit to Szentendre

The HDF NCO Academy in Szentendre hosted two outstanding events on March 22. One of these was the accreditation ceremony of the C-IED “Train the Trainer!" course at the military organization, the other was an official visit paid by the military attachés accredited in Hungary.

Speaking at the ceremony, Col. Jefferson Juhala, the representative of the NATO ACT C-IED Integrated Project Team (IPT) expressed his appreciation to the HDF NCO Academy and the legal predecessor military organization, the HDF Central Training Base for having prepared consistently since 2008 for acquiring NATO accreditation of the C-IED T3 course. This process ended successfully on April 22 last year.

Col. Zsolt Mikusi, the commandant-in-charge of the HDF NCO Academy delivered a speech, in which he pointed out that it was with the support of the MoD Defence Staff, the cooperation with the HDF Joint Force Command and the mentoring activity done by the ACT that the Academy acquired the accreditation of the course, so the “great teamwork has borne its fruits".

The colonel said that the NATO accreditation is an important milestone in national capability building. Drawing on its in-theatre experience, the staff of the International Training Department of the NCO Academy is able to guarantee the professional credibility of the “Szentendre workshop", as the colonel put it.

Gen. Tibor Benkő, the Chief of the MoD Defence Staff awarded tokens of appreciation to seven soldiers in recognition of their outstanding work in the field of national capability building and the successful NATO accreditation process.

In line with their annual program schedule organized by the Ministry of Defence Department of International Cooperation, the military attachés accredited to Budapest paid a visit to Szentendre on the same day, so they attended the ceremony too. In what followed, the attachés listened to Col. Mikusi who gave the commandant’s information briefing, then made a tour of the barracks.

Their program continued in the military training area at Csobánka, where the guests inspected the excellently equipped C-IED cabinet, then they watched a practical element of the NATO C-IED “Train the Trainer!" course (which started on March 19 with the participation of 13 nations), an ambush on a complex vehicle convoy.

At the end of the program, Col. Keresa Darko, the doyen of the attachés praised what they had seen in the barracks and the training area.