Armoured Vehicles for Malaysia and Lebanon
At DSA 2018, held 16-19 April in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, the Weststar Group of Malaysia displays the International Armored Group (IAG) GUARDIAN 4×4 APC. Weststar is partnered with IAG in providing the Malaysian government with IAG products and in 2015 received a contract to supply the Royal Malaysian Police with eight IAG JAWS 4×4 APC.
The company recently sold nine IAGs GUARDIANs to the Malaysian government for use by the Malaysian Armed Forces contingent serving as part of the United Nations Interim Force In Lebanon (UNIFL) and known as Malaysian Battalion 850 (MALBATT 850). A senior Malaysian Army officer told MONCh that the nine GUARDIANs are expected to arrive in Beirut this week via ship but the operational deployment with the unit will depend on the time taken to obtain clearance from the Lebanese government. MALBATT 850 currently has approximately 40 CONDORs 4×4 APCs and it is planned to slowly replace all the CONDORs with the GUARDIANs though this would depend on the finances available to the Malaysian government.
While the IAG GUARDIAN displayed at DSA 2018 had a remote control weapons station on it, the IAG GUARDIANs to Lebanon will only have a mounted machine gun on it as the Malaysian view is that an RCWS presents too aggressive a posture for its peacekeeping mission there.
Dzirhan Mahadzir