From March 14 to 22, 2024, a detachment of the Foreign Legion Detachment in Mayotte (DLEM) provided a military training mission to their partners in Lesotho, a sovereign enclave of South Africa.
Following a similar mission in that Southern African country in October 2023, an operational training detachment (DIO) comprising ten officers and legionnaires from the DLEM returned to Lesotho in mid-March to continue the military partnership between the two countries. This time, the DIO instruction was part of a three-week Peace Support Operation Course which aimed to enhance the skills and expertise of the Lesotho Defence Force (LDF) personnel. As one of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) member states, Lesotho frequently deploys its troops in various peacekeeping missions (e.g., in Mozambique, Congo), and therefore they need comprehensive and continuous training.
The legionnaires and their local partners exchanged know-how in tactics, high-intensity hand-to-hand combat (C4), first aid and shooting.
The DIO missions have been organized within the DLEM since the early 2010s. In September 2023, the DLEM deployed a DIO detachment to Madagascar; in February 2024, two DIO detachments deployed to Botswana (Southern Africa) and Seychelles (Indian Ocean).
As a matter of interest, the DLEM should be reorganized in the middle of this year and transformed into a new 5th Foreign Regiment (5e RE), the legendary unit that was inactivated in mid-2000.
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Related posts:
DLEM: 2023 DIO Training in Madagascar
DLEM: HQ Company on Glorioso Islands
DLEC: Foreign Legion Comoros Detachment
BLEM: Foreign Legion Madagascar Battalion 1956-1962