Today, 5 June 2009, Rear Admiral Jean Pierre Labonne (French Navy) handed over the responsibility of Deputy Operation Commander of the European Union Naval Force Operation ATALANTA, the EU anti-piracy campaign in the Horn of Africa area, to Rear Admiral Thorsten Kaehler (German Navy). The handover was conducted in the Operational Headquarters in Northwood near London.
Rear Admiral Labonne has admirably faced all the challenges of the operation from the beginning in December 2008. He will now return to France and reassume command as “Amiral Commandant la Force d’Action Navale á Brest”, Commander of the French naval action forces.
Rear Admiral Kaehler, prior to his new task, was the Deputy Director of the Policy Planning and Advisory Staff in the German Ministry of Defence in Berlin for the last three years. He will remain in the EU NAVFOR post until the end of the current mandate in mid-December 2009.