WATCH: 418 Peshmerga fighters graduate from Zakho Military Academy
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – Over 400 Peshmerga graduated from the Zakho Military Academy on Tuesday after more than six months of training.
In a special ceremony attended by Kurdish officials and military commanders, hundreds of men and women from the college’s 23rd group of alumni graduated, officially becoming Peshmerga fighters.
They received advanced weapon’s training among other skills they developed during their formation, according to the Military Academy’s Dean, Brigadier Nazir Assim Goran.
“We greatly benefitted from the six-month training. It physically prepared us and taught us the use of various weapons,” Tahsin Taha, one of the Peshmerga graduates, told Kurdistan 24.
Hoshang Haider, another Peshmerga graduate, said their courses focused on both theory and practice.
Deputy Peshmerga Minister, Sarbast Lazgin, said that the Ministry of Peshmerga would continue providing military training for the Kurdish fighters and encouraged all Peshmerga to enroll in the military academy.
The Zakho Military Academy was established in 1996. Since then, the college has had nearly 7,000 graduates among the Peshmerga forces and the Iraqi army.
Editing by Nadia Riva