European Command has announced the planned joint military exercise in western Ukraine has been indefinitely postponed because Ukraine’s military is “focused elsewhere.”
The exercise, Rapid Trident 14, is an annual training mission, and this year’s operation was scheduled to take place on the outskirts of the western city of Lviv.
EUCOM says that talks on organizing the exercise initially began with the elected government, but stalled when the protests in Kiev began. Eventually, they ousted the government, and the interim government is now busy attacking eastern protesters.
Rapid Trident was initially called Peace Shield, and aimed to train Ukraine’s military to take part in “peacekeeping” operations abroad. In recent years, it has focused on operational integration of Ukraine’s military with NATO forces in the region.
