UAE Air Force and Air Defence commander Brig Khalid bin Abdullah Mubarak has called for better co-operation between the six members of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) that would extend the Peninsula Shield groundforce to rapid reaction tasks as well as pool command and control and other resources. GCC members are Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The six commissioned the first stage of a Raytheon-supplied joint air defence system in late February. The Hizam Al Taawun - or Belt of Co-operation - programme is worth $160 million and includes an Ericsson communications system.

Source: Flight International