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| Tuesday, 19 October 2004 |
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A delegation representing the China Association for International Friendly Contact (CAIFC) headed by Madam Xiao Rong called on Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar last Saturday. Madam Rong is the daughter of the late leader of modern China. This is Madam Rong's first visit to South Asia and she selected Sri Lanka as the first country to be visited by her as she has had from her childhood a keen desire to visit Sri Lanka. The purpose of her visit is to promote Sri Lanka-China relations particulary in the context of people-to-people contact. She recalled having been in the greeting party, as a young girl, which received the late Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike on her first visit to China. During her middle school years she learnt traditional Sri Lankan dances and had read about and seen pictures of Sri Lanka. In her own words she had "brilliant impressions" of Sri Lanka which nurtured her wish to visit the country. She said that Sirimavo Bandaranaike is a "household name" in China. Madam Rong after Girls Middle School worked for three years in a rural village, later studied medicine and graduated from the Beijing Medical College. In the early 80s she worked as a diplomatic officer in the Chinese Embassy in Washington D.C. She was Deputy to the Eighth National People's Congress and an Executive Member of the Sixth All China Women's Federation. She is now Vice Chairperson of the CAFIC, Vice chairperson of the China Charity Foundation, Vice Chairperson of the Sino-Russia Committee for Peace, Friendship and Development, Executive President of the Beijing Music Festival, a member of the Chinese Writers Association, author of many articles in newspapers and magazines and in 1993 a biography titled "My Father Deng Xiaoping" which has been translated into Japanese, Russian, English, French, Korean, Thai and Dutch. Madam Rong gifted a copy of this book to Foreign Minister Kadirgamar, states a Foreign Ministry Press release. |
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