Arabic college helps spread language studies

More than 20 envoys and 1,800 people benefitted from Beijing’s language institute

The Arabic Language College in the Beijing Foreign Studies University was set up in 1958, and was one of the first colleges in China to offer Masters and Doctoral degree programmes in Arabic language studies.

The college

had

qualified more than 1,800 people operating in the field diplomacy, trade, culture, education and media, as well as more than 20 Chinese ambassadors assigned to Arab countries.

The college received massive support from the UAE. In 1990, during a historic visit to China, the late Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan provided a generous grant, setting up the UAE Centre for Arabic Language and Islamic studies, which was completed and built in 1994.

In April 2007, Shaikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Foreign Minister, visited the centre and announced a $1 million (Dh3.67 million) grant by President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan to support the centre’s academic operations.

In 2012, His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, visited the centre and attended the reopening ceremony following the completion of renovations works that were fully financed by the UAE Government, and the centre was renamed the ‘Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan Centre for Arabic Language Studies’.

The centre’s UAE related achievements included the translation and publication of My Vision: Challenges in the Race for Excellence by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, hosting the ‘UAE through Chinese eyes’ photography exhibition in cooperation with the Chinese Embassy in the UAE and the UAE Embassy in Beijing, and other achievements in the field of literature and cultural activities.

and

Islamic