Military EOD Engineers – 20 Years in the Service of Nation

Chisinau, October 19, 2012 — The Chief of Main Staff, Commander of the National Army, Brigadier Gen. Vitalie Stoian, attended the 20^th anniversary ceremony of Codru EOD Battalion held in Straseni.

The Commander of the National Army congratulated the unit staff on the 20^th anniversary and thanked the EOD engineers for commitment, dedication and spirit of responsibility they show each day while carrying out mine disposal missions on the national and international territory. “I was honored to command with two contingents deployed to the post-war rehabilitation mission in Iraq and together, we did our duty with responsibility, being appreciated by our foreign partners”, Brigadier Gen. Stoian said.

The President of Straseni District, Petru Volosciuc, thanked on behalf of the entire community to the EOD engineers for the courage and sacrifice show throughout twenty years of activity. “The Missions of liguidation of explosive devices, obsolete ammunition disposal and weather consequences relief operations aroused the people’s confidence in what you do”, Petru Volosciuc said.

During the event, a group of servicemen were awarded military medals and the former commanders of the EOD Battalion received the jubilee coin of the Battalion.

The EOD Battalion is the first National Army unit to be awarded “Credinta patriei” (Loyalty to Motherland) Order, Class I, in 2010. The unit was created on October 16, 1992. One of the core missions of the battalion is the investigation, discovery, identification, neutralization, transportation and liquidation of explosive devices on the territory of the Republic of Moldova. The Battalion’s EOD engineers carried out so far about 1114 mine disposal mission and destroyed tens of thousands of explosive devices.

Twenty servicemen of the battalion participated at the international post-conflict humanitarian operation in Iraq, where they destroyed 395054 explosive devices.