Defence Minister Tvrdik on Middle East trip
On Monday, Czech Defence Minister Jaroslav Tvrdik left for a three-day trip to the Middle East. Mr Tvrdik visited the Czech anti-chemical unit in Kuwait and travelled to Iraq to take a look at the state of the Czech field hospital that is currently being built in the city of Basra. Earlier on Wednesday, Dita Asiedu spoke to our correspondent Jaromir Marek, who was part of the Czech delegation:
You've spent some time with the anti-chemical unit. What does Camp Doha look like? Could you describe the atmosphere there?
"The camp is quite large. Now there are eight thousand soldiers in one camp and the conditions are very basic. All soldiers stay in one very large room without any privacy. The temperature is also quite different from Europe. When we arrived, it was nearly forty degrees Celsius, and it only dropped to thirty degrees at night. So it's quite difficult to stay and do some work."
"Even when you drive through the country, it looks very poor, very much destroyed by the war and the period of totalitarianism under Saddam Hussein. Basra is a city with a population of 1.5 million and the people have little water. Some water is supplied by the Red Cross and the Czech Army. The situation there is quite difficult. Regarding the Czech military hospital, it is situated in a former military hospital. Only a third of its staff is there. The rest is on its way from the Czech Republic. I spoke with doctors and nurses and they told me they are able to treat as many as seventy patients a day. They are working in a tent where temperatures reach between forty and forty five degrees Celsius. But the Iraqi people are quite happy to have them there."
