Some of the FACA soldiers who graduated on 5 August were equipped with Rwandan-style Type 81-1 rifles and helmets. (Rwanda Defence Force)
The Rwanda Defence Force (RDF) has completed the training of a second battalion for the Central African Republic (CAR), the Rwandan Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced on 5 August.
The MoD said a ceremony had been held at Camp Kassaï in Bangui on 5 August to mark the graduation of 634 soldiers – 55 of them females – who had completed seven months of basic military training by the RDF and the Central African Armed Forces (FACA).
It quoted Chief of General Staff of the FACA Major General Zephlin Mamadou as saying the battalion was the second to be trained by RDF instructors.
The RDF released photographs showing CAR soldiers wearing the badge and beret of the Rapid Intervention Battalion (BIR) that were first seen in February, when the FACA announced that the new unit had become operational and released photographs of a ceremony at Camp Kassaï where the soldiers were given their berets.
The graduating soldiers in the RDF photographs of the latest ceremony were dressed in teal-coloured uniforms rather than the camouflage ones worn by their colleagues in February. Several carried Chinese-made Type 81-1 assault rifles fitted with a foregrip, a combination that is seemingly only used by the RDF.
The FACA also announced the 5 August ceremony but did not identify the graduates as the personnel for a second BIR or credit Rwanda with training them.
Rwanda currently contributes three battalions and a formed police unit to the United Nations (UN) peacekeeping mission in the CAR and has deployed a fourth battalion independently of any multinational missions since December 2020.
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