The Vietnamese peacekeeping force, including the Military Engineering Unit No.1 and the Level-2 Field Hospital No.4 held a departure ceremony on April 27 at Hanoi-based Noi Bai International Airport to perform their task at the UN Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA) mission.
Female military officers of Vietnam before the departure time for UN peacekeeping mission
This is the first time that Vietnam has dispatched a large force to participate in UN peacekeeping operations since the start of joining in June 2014.
Since June 2014, Việt Nam has deployed three level-2 field hospitals to South Sudan. The first two fulfilled their tasks and already returned home while the third departed for the African country on March 23.
After 8 years, Vietnam has sent 76 officers to perform UN missions in South Sudan, Central African Republic and UNISFA alongside 189 medical officers and staff from the Level 2 Field Hospitals to the South Sudan mission.
The participating force this time includes the 184-member Military Engineering Unit, which has been preparing for more than 5 years, with highly qualified personnel. Most of them are engineers, machine experts, construction workers of high level, selected from 21 units
The destination this time for officers and soldiers is the UNISFA mission, located in Abyei, Africa.
Abyei is an area covering more than 10,000 square kilometers, located in the border area between Sudan and South Sudan. Abyei was granted "special administrative status" by the 2004 Protocol on the settlement of conflicts in the Sudanese civil war.
Apart from the Military Engineering Unit No1, Vietnam continued to send officers from the Level 2 Field Hospital No. 4 to go on a mission in South Sudan, with 63 servicemen, including 10 female officers.
Major General Hoang Kim Phung, Director of the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations under the Ministry of Defence, said
For the time being, the Military Engineering Unit is ready for their mission along with equipment, prepared weapons and capabilities that the UN front-line team has tested.
The UN has rated Vietnam's engineering unit as the most typical of the 15 engineering teams which was deployed at UNISFA and selected by the end of October 2021.
The tasks of the engineering unit proposed by the United Nations to the Vietnamese side include two main tasks, with the first on carrying out construction projects such as airports, ports, drainage works, camps, well drilling activities serving refugees in border areas. The second task is to build high-rise buildings, Phung went on to say.
After 8 years of participating in UN peacekeeping mission, the image of the Vietnamese soldiers has left many good impressions in the eyes of friends around the world.
UN leaders have repeatedly sent letters of commendation and thanks to the Vietnamese Government for the positive contributions of Vietnamese soldiers to the UN peacekeeping mission.
