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Nigeria Could Not Provide Equipment For Its Military Training - US Amb Entwistle
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January 9, 2015
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1:11Now PlayingThe United States on Friday explained why the training of the Nigerian military was suspended by the Nigerian government.
US Ambassador to Nigeria said: "We have already started training, at the request of Nigerian government, to train one of its battalions up to a world class standard. We brought in the best military trainers in the world. But the agreement with the government was that we will provide the trainers in order to do this properly, the Nigerian army will provide the equipment needed to do this training. It is a partnership. We are doing this together. It is not something we are doing for you.
"Training started, but sadly it got to a point that we had to stop because the equipment was not available.
"And after several weeks of waiting, we could not keep the trainers here and the Nigerian government decided to end the training.
"I say this with great regret, it was a great opportunity to train a world class battalion but unfortunately it stopped at the request of your government. But his doesn't have to derail our cooperation. Whatever reasons were for that, we continue to move forward. As I have said, could we do training again in the future, sure everything is possible.
Mr Entwistle said the ideas that there are arms embargo against Nigeria are not true, insisting that no country is doing more to support Nigeria in its fight against terror that the American government.
There have been rumours that the United States had placed embargo on sales of arms to Nigeria and that it had prevented the oil rich nation from obtaining arms to prosecute a counter terrorism operation in the north-east a major terrorist enclave. The region has been under attack by a terrorist group Boko Haram for over five years now.
Relations between both countries are said to have witnessed setbacks as a result of the arms deal controversies, something that has also been linked with the abrupt termination of a training programme for Nigeria's battalion few months ago.
But, on Channels Television on Friday, the US Ambassador to Nigeria, James Entwistle, said that there was no arms embargo, describing the claims that the US had cut Nigeria off as 'nonsense'.
"Ideas that there are arms embargo and that the US has cut Nigeria off is nonsense.
"No country is doing more to support Nigeria in its fight against terror right now. We can't talk about the details in public but I can assure you that we are with you every step of the way.
"We have a number of discussions right now for various pieces of equipment in the air, on the ground and army personnel carriers. We share information everyday with your army that they can use operationally.
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