Wellington – The main body of a New Zealand military training contingent left for Australia on Tuesday en route to Iraq to help in the fight against Islamic State insurgents.
According to the statement, the contingent was farewell by Governor Gen. Jerry Mateparae and senior New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) commanders.
It said that NZDF had kept the departure secret for security reasons and would not be supplying details in advance of the onward deployment to the Middle East from Australia.
The government announced in February that up to 143 NZDF personnel would be deployed on a joint mission with Australia to help build the capacity of the Iraqi security forces.
The statement said that the Building Partner Capacity mission was a non-combat mission for a two-year period, with a review to be conducted after nine months. (Xinhua/NAN)[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”10″]