- TOKYO (Reuters) -- Japan's
military is experimenting with a new form of camouflage.
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- Male Japanese soldiers heading for Iraq on a historic
mission over the next couple of months are being advised to grow moustaches
so as to fit in with the local people, said a spokesperson at their base
in Asahikawa on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.
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- The 10 or so women members of the 600-strong contingent
are being issued with dark green scarves to cover their hair in accordance
with local custom.
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- Drinking alcohol and eating pork will be forbidden within
the Japanese army base, which is to be constructed outside the southern
town of Samawa.
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- "We are not going there to wage war, but to help
with reconstruction. The success of the mission depends largely on how
far we are able to establish friendly relations with local people,"
the spokesperson said.
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- The deployment of troops to take part in humanitarian
work after the invasion of Iraq constitutes Japan's riskiest military mission
since World War 2.
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- But favourable Iraqi reaction to the mustachioed Colonel
Masahisa Sato, the leader of an advance party dispatched to the southern
Iraqi town of Samawa last month, seems to have proved the advantages of
facial hair.
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- "What a magnificent moustache. He looks just like
an Iraqi," a Japanese newspaper quoted one local resident as saying.
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- http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=29&art_id=qw1075886642437B236&set_id=1
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