LAHORE - Mr Zhao Shiren Chinese Counsel General in Lahore awarded “Friendship Award 2023” to daily The Nation in recognition of its excellent reporting on promotion of Pakistan-China friendship, CPEC and Belt & Road Initiative. Col (Retd) Sayed Ahmad Nadeem Qadri, Chief Operating Officer of Nawa-i-Waqt Media Group, representing MD of Nawa-i-Waqt Group, Rameeza Majid Nizami, received this award from Mr. Zhao Shiren. The award ceremony was held at a local hotel in Lahore, where friendship awards 2023 were distributed among various institutions and personalities. Provincial Minister S.M. Tanveer, Home Secretary Punjab Shakeel Ahmad, DIG SPU Tayyab Hafeez Cheema, President LCCI Kashif Anwar, President Lahore Press Club Azam Ch and other distinguished personalities, media persons and families were present at the occasion.
“President Xi Jinping’s special representative and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng’s July visit to Islamabad, coupled with Prime Minister Anwar Kakar’s successful visit to China in October, have produced fruitful outcomes. The state of China-Pakistan relations is strong, shimmering in sunlight and will grow ever stronger with each passing day,” the Consul General said.
“I’m happy to share with you that the Chinese Consulate General in Lahore, in partnership with the key stakeholders in the province, has also achieved some accomplishments. We have made corresponding efforts to enhance mutual confidence, business cooperation, cultural, educational and people-to-people exchanges between the concerned Chinese regions and provinces and the Punjab. Our joint celebration of the 72rd anniversary of the diplomatic relations between China and Pakistan was quite a success. We held a gala event commemorating the 74th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, with both Honorable Governor and the Chief Minister in attendance..…This year, we organized and facilitated three delegations from Punjab to visit Ningxia Autonomous Region, Jiangsu province and Beijing and Shenzhen respectively, yielding productive results. We helped receive two Chinese delegations to Lahore in pursuit of cooperation on agriculture and law enforcement capacity-building…..For the first time, we helped secure visa facilitation authorizations to 13 chambers of commerce and industry in Punjab, including the Punjab Board of Investment and Trade. It has been in effect since December 18th. We continued the CCG Scholarship programs in Okara and Sheikhupura districts, and established more in local Universities. This initiative remains open to the qualified colleges and universities in Punjab. …..We stepped up security awareness campaigns and provided more proactive consular service to the Chinese community, asking them to strictly follow the SOP to ensure maximum safety.” CG added. The attendees were briefed more outcomes on the occasion.
Col Nadeem Qadri (Retd) said in his speech that we profoundly thank His Excellency Mr. Zhao Shiren for conferring this prestigious Friendship Award to “The Nation”. Pakistan’s one of the oldest Media Group Nawa-i-Waqt has been conducting programmes “Nawa-i-Chin” in its electric as well as print media. Now for almost last five years myself and my colleague Mr. Khawar Abbas Sandhu are writing regularly on Belt and Road Initiative to CPEC to develop understanding of this gigantic programme to our Urdu readers, the language which is understood in all parts of country.