Serbia is purchasing US aircrafts?

http://www.airforcetimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1891933.php

Serbian pilots to train at academy

Associated Press

BELGRADE, Serbia — The U.S. Air Force will sponsor training for Serbian pilots at its U.S. academy in Colorado as part of widening military cooperation, the American ambassador to Belgrade said Friday.

Ambassador Michael C. Polt spoke at Serbia’s main army airfield outside Belgrade, standing beside two U.S. F-16 fighter jets that landed a day earlier — a first such stop in a country that was targeted in a NATO bombing campaign in 1999.

“Today is an important day in the growing security relationship of Serbia and the United States,” Polt said. “Our two militaries are again beginning to cooperate in a new kind of fight: in the global war on terrorism” and other threats.

Military ties between the two countries have been improving since the 2000 ouster of the late President Slobodan Milosevic, a key figure in the Balkan wars of the 1990s.

Milosevic’s 1998 crackdown on the ethnic Albanian separatists in Serbia’s southern Kosovo province led to the punitive NATO airstrikes, which left hundreds dead and inflicted heavy damage on Serbia’s infrastructure.

Diplomatic relations were restored after a new government took over in Belgrade in 2000 and began reviving ties with Washington.

“This coming year U.S. Air Forces Europe will be sponsoring training for the Serbian Air and Air Defense forces here and in the United States, dealing with safety, logistics and maintenance, pilot training, and search and rescue,” Polt said.

“Attendance to the U.S. Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs is now open for applicants from Serbia,” the ambassador said, expressing hope that “the first-ever Serbian officer” will be attending the academy in 2007.

Serbia’s army chief, Zdravko Ponos, will visit Washington next week, Stankovic added.

Polt referred to a “long history of friendship” between the countries.

“We were close allies in two world wars. Serbs and Americans fought Nazism in Europe and many American servicemen owe their lives to their rescuers from Serbia,” he said referring to U.S. pilots downed by Nazis over Serbia but safely evacuated by Serbian resistance fighters.

Still, Serbia’s desire for closer ties with NATO remains blocked until the Balkan country extradites Gen. Ratko Mladic, the wartime commander of Bosnian Serbs, indicted by the U.N. war crimes court for major atrocities.

“The United States is willing to move forward as fast as Serbia is able to remove any remaining obstacles to our security relationship,” Polt said.

Belgrade authorities have said they cannot locate the fugitive.

Defense Minister Zoran Stankovic said “we want to improve cooperation” with the United States. “Besides, we have no alternative.”

If I am reading above article correctly ,especially part that is saying “safety, logistics and maintenance, pilot training, and search and rescue ” it looks that Serbian Air Force will be equipped with US combat aircrafts , most likely F-16 and most likely date of their introduction will be sometimes in 2008/2009 and that wail nicely fit with previous announcements that MiG-21 will be pulled out of service by 2010.
Now there is interesting question ..what will happen with planed refurbishment of current MiG-29 and purchase of additional MiG-29.Are we going to have situation that Serbian Air Force will operate both types for some period of time.(one squadron of MiG-29 and one squadron of F-16)