| 摘要 |
The present invention comprises an apparatus and method supporting handover of mobile relay nodes, RNs (56), in a wireless communication network (60), in a manner that advantageously differentiates handling of control- and user-plane connections of the wireless communication devices (58) supported by the RN (56). Rather than conventionally anchoring the control-plane connections of relay-connected UEs (58) at the donor radio base station (54-1) supporting the RN (56), the donor radio base station (54-1) includes or is communicatively linked to an anchor node (100) that, from the perspective of the involved control plane entity or entities (70) in a supporting Core Network, CN (68), anchors those connections. The anchor node (100) facilitates handover between donor radio base stations (54-1, 54-2) such that the control-plane connections are retained at the anchor node (100) while the user-plane connections are switched to the target radio base station (54-2) receiving the RN (56) in handover.
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