South Korean Buddhist pilgrims to visit sacred places in KP: Envoy

islamabad — The South Korean government has planned to arrange a visit of pilgrims to the Buddhist sacred places in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa during March-April this year.

This was stated by South Korea’s Ambassador to Pakistan Kwak Sung-Kyu in an interview. The ambassador himself is working on the arrangements for the visit.

The ambassador said the initiative would help strengthen cultural ties between Pakistan and South Korea and help boost religious tourism in Pakistan.

Kwak Sung-Kyu said the initiative will be followed by two other projects. One project deals with improving capacity building for preserving artefacts while a team of officials and experts, especially those who work in museums having collection of Buddhist art from the Gandhara-era will be invited to Korea soon.

The Korean ambassador said

that Pakistan and South Korea have been enjoying warm cultural relations which are deep rooted in history. Common heritage of Buddhism is of particular importance for further cementing cultural and religious ties between the two countries.

The Korean ambassador recently handed over state-of-theart conservation equipment worth $50,000 to the Department of Archeology and Museums (DoAM), Islamabad, for preserving the artefacts.

The equipment will help in preservation of moveable antiquities, including specimen of the Buddhist art recovered from the remains of Buddhist sanctuaries in the Gandhara region.

The equipment included environmental control system for museum, devices for cleaning and conservation of antiquities including conservation consumables, stereo-microscope, ultrasonic cleaner etc.

The equipment will play a key role in promoting country’s capacity to conserve its cultural heritage as per international level. —