Free Syrian Army fighters (Reuters/Muzaffar Salman)
In the past three months some 200 men have already received training in two camps in the east and the south of Jordan, Der Spiegel reports. The military training focuses on the use of anti-tank weaponry, the news magazine reported, citing what it said were participants and organizers. It adds that there are plans to provide training for a total of 1,200 fighters from the Free Syrian Army – the opposition force battling the regime of President Bashar Assad.
Foreign instructors are training Syrian rebels in modern warfare in Jordan, suggest media reports from Europe. Sources claim the trainees will be the security force if Assad goes, while the combat skills they are being taught distort the picture.
The report said that some of the Americans wore army uniforms, but it did not specify whether they worked for private firms or represented the US military.
Last October the Pentagon confirmed that a small group of US special forces and military advisers had spent the summer in Jordan training the country’s military to act in case Syria used its chemical weapons. Reportedly, select groups of Syrian rebels were trained, too.
As Britain’s The Guardian reported on Friday, the US is not alone in their efforts. UK and French instructors are also in Jordan training the Syria rebels.
Though the American, British and French Defense Ministries have not commented so far on the information about the FSA being trained in Jordan, this move does not contradict either the US plans for non-lethal directaid to Syrian opposition or British understanding of the EU arms embargo enforced on Syria.......................................
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