1-13 Sept 2003

Rehearsing peace support operations News 03/09/03 - IMS Exercise Cooperative Key 2003: NATO/Partnership for Peace exercise in Bulgaria 27/08/03 - AFSOUTH Exercise Cooperative Key 2003: NATO Partnership for Peace exercise in Bulgaria Multimedia High resolution photos of the exercise Links AFSOUTH website Military personnel from eight NATO countries, six invitee and six partner countries will join forces in Exercise Cooperative Key 2003 in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, 1 to 13 September. The annual exercise is based on a fictitious scenario in which NATO and partner nations deploy about 1,000 military personnel and more than 70 aircraft in a multi-national task force in support of humanitarian operations. This is the second time that Bulgaria hosts Cooperative Key, the previous time being in 2001. The participating NATO countries are Canada, France, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Turkey, and the United States of America. Six invitees, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia and partner countries Azerbaijan, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Moldova, Sweden and Switzerland are also taking part. Representatives of several international non-governmental organizations will also participate. Cooperative Key is one of many NATO initiatives aimed at building interoperability between NATO and partner nations in conducting peace support operations.