Forty members of the protection and rescue services from Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina pased the training and an intervention exercise for providing first aid in the event of an accident. The training was held in Nikšić in the period from November 22 to 24 within the project “Joint Response”, which is financed by the European Union. The aim was strengthening readiness for rescue interventions, as well as improving cross-border cooperation.

Through the presentation of carefully selected and prepared topics, as well as practical work that enabled the verification of acquired knowledge and skills, the rescuers significantly improved their preparedness for providing first aid in the event of various types of accidents. In addition, the three-day joint work contributed to the improvement of cross-border cooperation, which is extremely important in the field of protection and rescue.

Željko Loncović, one of the instructors, highlighted the importance of the training and stated: “Given that the participants are members of the protection and rescue services who are usually the first to arrive on the scene, this training is of vital importance for rescuing injured and life-threatening persons, as and for the education of rescuers in order to properly help victims. Such trainings need to be carried out continuously in order to raise the level of readiness of the units participating in the rescue.

Marko Jancer, one of the participants of the training and exercise from the Nikšić Protection and Rescue Services, stated: “The basis of every rescue is providing quality first aid. If we break the rules of providing first aid, we could not call it rescue. That is why it is mandatory for every rescuer to have a good knowledge of first aid, and that is why this training is of key importance for us, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the instructors who share their valuable knowledge with us, which is of great help to us in our further work.”

The “Joint Response” project is implemented within the framework of the IPA Program for cross-border cooperation Bosnia and Herzegovina – Montenegro, which is financed by the European Union, and in Montenegro is co-financed by the Ministry of Public Administration.

The project is implemented by the Directorate for Civil Protection and Firefighting of the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton, which is the lead partner in the project, in partnership with FORS Montenegro and the Association for Entrepreneurship and Business LiNK Mostar.