MNC-SE Change of Command Ceremony

On February 28, the Multinational Corps South East (HQ MNC-SE) held a change of command ceremony in the Sibiu garrison.

The ceremony was attended by the Chief of the Defense Staff, General Daniel PETRESCU, the Deputy Commander of the Allied Joint Forces Command in Naples, Lieutenant General Jocelyn PAUL, the Commander of the Allied Ground Forces Command (LANDCOM), Lieutenant General Roger J. CLOUTIER, and representatives of public authorities and structures in the national system of defense, public order and national security.

Lieutenant-General Tomiță-Cătălin TOMESCU, who has been in charge of HQ MNC-SE since its establishment in July 2020, has handed over command of the multinational corps to Major General Dragoş IACOB, the new commander of this NATO structure in Sibiu.

Following the change of command ceremony, Lieutenant General Tomiță-Cătălin Tomescu was honoured with a retirement ceremony, marking the completion of a distinguished military career spanning more than 40 years in the country’s service. The President of Romania signed the decree of retirement as he reached the standard retirement age. Lieutenant-General Tomiță-Cătălin Tomescu was awarded the Emblem of Merit in the Service of the Romanian Army, class I, on this occasion as a form of gratitude for the entire activity carried out in the Romanian Army and NATO force structures.

General Daniel PETRESCU Romanian, Chief of the Defense Staff, thanked him in his speech for his honorable service throughout his military career, especially for his contribution to the development of this NATO headquarters: “Lieutenant-General TOMESCU concludes his distinguished career as the first commander of the Multinational Corps South-East. It set audacious objectives that it achieved, and it played a crucial part in this ambitious project that Romania proposed to the North Atlantic Alliance at the 2018 Brussels Summit”.

Lieutenant General TOMESCU thanked the military officials from the country and abroad present at the ceremony for their support in carrying out the missions and objectives assumed with the appointment of HQ MNC – SE, and awarded medals, the HQ MNC-SE Medal of Honor and the HQ MNC-SE Commendation Medal, to those who made significant contributions to the headquarters’ development.

At the end of the retirement ceremony, Lieutenant-General (rz) Tomiță-Cătălin TOMESCU delivered a brief overview of his military career’s major milestones and wished the new commander and the HQ MNC-SE team, all the best in completing the development process and operationalizing of the structure, in order to achieve Complete Operational Capacity at the planned term.

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HQ MNC-SE ensures coordination of forces within the NATO presence in the region, operational coherence between national defense plans and allies, as well as better operational integration with Allied forces, in support of strengthening the security architecture on the eastern flank of the North Atlantic Alliance.