TBILISI. Sept 28 (Interfax-AVN) - The Georgian and French Defense Ministries signed a cooperation agreement in Tbilisi on Tuesday, Natia Chikovani, head of the Georgian ministry's PR department told Interfax-Military News Agency.
Deputy chiefs-of-staff Levan Nikolaishvili of Georgia and Maurice Launet of France signed the agreement on military cooperation today," Chikovani said.
The agreement provides for, in particular, developing cooperation between the Georgian and French Defense Ministries in mountain rifle and military medical training, as well as in personnel support.
Chikovani recalled that France has been providing material assistance to the mountain rifle training center in Sachkheri in Western Georgia for a few years.
"A team of French mountain rifle instructors will arrive in Georgia in 2005, and Georgian servicemen will be sent to France for probation," she said.
Moreover, a military medical service will be created in the Sachkheri center with the help of French experts in 2005, she added.
Nikolaishvili told reporters in Tbilisi on Tuesday that a vessel will deliver material and technical aid for the Georgian Defense Ministry from France to Batumi within two weeks. He did not specify the nature of the aid.