Belgium's Defence Minister Theo Francken (N-VA) and Chief of Staff Frederik Vansina decorated two Romanian soldiers on Tuesday for rescuing Belgian colleagues during an exercise in the Romanian mountains last September.
Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, a Belgian detachment has been active in Romania as part of a NATO mission to strengthen the eastern border. At the end of September, a Belgian company took part in an exercise in the southern Carpathians.
After a few days, the weather changed, with heavy rainfall, snow, strong winds and low temperatures, prompting the Belgian command to decide to withdraw the Belgian soldiers. At that point, 22 Belgian soldiers had already had to leave the exercise due to previous injuries or because they were suffering from hypothermia.
On 3 October, four remaining Belgian soldiers had to be evacuated. The weather conditions were too bad for the equipment that the Belgian army had on site.
Two Romanian soldiers eventually rescued the Belgians with snowmobiles. The operation took six hours, and the Romanians had to drive back and forth several times between the aid station and the Belgian positions.
The Romanians also had to be admitted to the hospital afterwards. On Tuesday, they received a medal from Francken and Vansina in Sibiu, a city in the centre of Romania.
