Windfall for Namibian youth project
WINDHOEK — The Chinese embassy in Namibia and Chineseowned mining company Swakop Uranium, donated 1 million Namibian dollars ($69,000) to the One Economy Foundation founded by the First Lady of Namibia, Monica Geingos on Feb 18.
At the donation handover ceremony, the first lady said that the money will be mainly used for the #BeFree campaign, which she launched in 2016.
The campaign, undertaken with the assistance of the United Nations Fund for Population Activities and the organization’s joint program to combat HIV and AIDS, was inspired by the latter’s drive to ensure an AIDS-free generation by 2020 through the Start Free, Stay Free, AIDS-Free initiative.
Speaking at the event, Geingos said this donation will go directly to the project, and said that she would personally make sure it reaches its beneficiaries.
“I am excited to speak about the #BeFree project and, in the next two weeks, we will be unveiling the finer details of the project for which we are going to use these funds. We are looking to raise 30 million Namibian dollars for the initiative and this 1 million is an absolutely fantastic investment into it,” she said, thanking both parties for the donation.
The Chinese Ambassador to Namibia Zhang Yiming said the donation exhibits their care and highlights their motive of youth empowerment.
“We are glad to give support to the #BeFree project,” he said, adding that the initiative helps to alleviate youth unemployment and extreme poverty.
The first ladies of both China and Namibia are committed to the education and empowerment of women and young people, he said, adding that China is willing to strengthen cooperation with Namibia in promoting youth development as well as supporting sustainable economic and social development.
WUHAN — With a Chinese calligraphy brush in hand, two Pakistani students, Amar Razzaq and Waseem Abbas, wrote down the Chinese character fu.
“Fu means blessing in Chinese, and I hope the Year of the Ox will bring good luck to us,” says Razzaq.
It was part of the Spring Festival activities organized recently by Huazhong Agricultural University in Wuhan, capital of Central China’s Hubei province, which attracted a number of international students.
“We missed Spring Festival last year as Wuhan was then hit hard by COVID-19. Now, the city has returned to its normal hustle and bustle, and we want to make up for that missed Spring Festival atmosphere this year,” says Abbas.
They are PhD students at the university, with majors in agricultural economic management and functional genomics of rice.
“Wuhan is well-known for its education, with over 1.2 million college students. It’s also a modern metropolis which has undergone rapid development and offers sufficient opportunities for international students to study and work,” says Razzaq, who has developed a deep affection for Wuhan.
We missed Spring Festival last year ... and we want to make up for that missed Spring Festival atmosphere this year.”
Waseem Abbas, Pakistani student, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan
He adds that international students are cherishing this winter holiday as they recall the tough days Wuhan endured over the last year.
At the beginning of 2020, they had planned to visit their Chinese friends and have New Year’s Eve dinner with them. However, the plan fell through when the sudden COVID-19 outbreak saw Wuhan announce an emergency lockdown.
“Everything changed overnight,” Razzaq recalls. “But we decided to stay.”
“We believed China would be able to overcome such a difficulty, and that the lockdown was a reasonable measure to curb the spread of the virus,” Abbas says.
To keep international students from getting infected, they devoted themselves to distributing epidemic prevention materials and food to foreign students at the university. Razzaq was also in charge of taking the body temperature of students and recording their health condition during the lockdown.
“The epidemic prevention work went smoothly and many students participated in the volunteer work,” Abbas says.
“There were rumors that international students in Wuhan didn’t have protection at that time, but we posted on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram to show people that we were well protected and leading a comfortable life,” Razzaq says.
This year marks the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Pakistan. Not long ago, China decided to provide COVID-19 vaccines to Pakistan to battle the coronavirus. Razzaq and Abbas cheered as a batch of the vaccines was sent from Beijing to Pakistan on Jan 31.
“Thanks to China for providing vaccines to Pakistan. It will consolidate the bilateral relationship between the two countries,” Razzaq says.
Naomi Osaka’s victory at the Australian Open moved the Japanese superstar up one spot to No 2 in the WTA rankings Monday, while men’s finalist Daniil Medvedev
rose to a career-best No 3 behind winner Novak Djokovic on the ATP list.
Jennifer Brady, the 25-year-old American who was the runner-up to Osaka, jumped 11 spots to No 13, her first time inside the top 20.
Aslan Karatsev’s historic run from qualifying to the final four before losing to nine-time Australian Open champion Djokovic allowed the Russian to vault 72 places from 114th to 42nd.
Karatsev is the first man in the professional era to reach the semifinals in his debut in the main draw of a major tournament.
Despite winning the past two Grand Slam tournament she entered, Osaka still trails No 1 Ash Barty — who lost in the quarterfinals at Melbourne Park — because of the way the tennis tours are calculating what they’re calling “frozen” rankings following last season’s hiatus caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The International Ice Hockey Federation has announced its seedings for the 22 teams slated to play at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, and as expected Canada is ranked No 1 in the men’s tournament and No 2 in the women’s.
The men’s tournament will use the same format as the four previous Winter Olympics, with 12 teams split into three groups of four.
Team Canada will compete in Group A with the United States (seeded No 6), Germany (7) and host China (12). Group B will include Russia (2), Czech Republic (5), Switzerland (8) and qualifier 3 (11), while Group C consists of Finland (3), Sweden (4), qualifier 1 (9) and qualifier 2 (10).
The qualifiers will be determined in the final pre-Olympic tournament, scheduled for Aug 26-29 in Latvia, Norway and Slovakia.
The women’s tournament at Beijing 2022 will be contested by a record 10 teams, in two tiered groups of five. The top five according to the 2020 IIHF world rankings
— the US, Canada, Finland, Russia and Switzerland — will play in Group A, while Japan (6) will head Group B, along with three qualifiers from the final pre-Olympic tournament in November (seeds 7-9) and China (10). The top three finishers in Group B will compete in the playoff round.
With the exception of host China and perhaps one qualifier, all the men’s teams will include players from the National Hockey League.
That gives Canada a huge advantage, with the likes of superstar forwards Sidney Crosby (Pittsburgh Penguins), Connor McDavid (Edmonton Oilers) and Nathan MacKinnon (Colorado Avalanche) among their ranks, along with perennial All-Star goaltender Carey Price (Montreal Canadiens) and defensemen Cale Makar (Colorado), Shea Weber (Montreal) and Morgan Reilly (Toronto Maple Leafs).
The NHL did not allow its players to participate in the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, and the fact that Crosby, who will be 34 when the puck drops in Beijing, is probably the only member of the 2010 and 2014 gold-medal teams assured of a
return trip in 2022, bears out general manager Doug Armstrong’s pledge that “youth will be served, for sure”.
“Team Canada will see something of the changing of the guard in 2022,” Armstrong said after being
appointed GM last month. “We want to be fast, we want to use our skill and we want to use our depth to our advantage.
“The NHL is a quick league right now and I think that we have the players that can play the 200-foot (61-meter) game. We want to be a fast and difficult team to play against.”
Canada dominated the 2014 Sochi Games with a suffocating defensive performance on the larger international-size ice surface, but high-octane offense will be paramount on Beijing’s NHL-sized rink, led by players like McDavid, MacKinnon and Auston Matthews of the US, each of whom helped light up the 2016 World Cup as members of the 23-and-under Team North America.
“I think that the World Cup showed the excitement and the flair that Young Guns team put on the ice,” said Armstrong. “This group that we’re going to assemble is probably going to have a lot of faces that have never worn the Canadian jersey at this level of competition. It’s going to be fun.”
Meanwhile, the recent appointment of Harbin native Yu Baiwei as a playing assistant coach bodes well for China’s hopes of advancing out of Group B and possibly making the podium in the 2022 women’s tournament.
Yu, 32, is the highest-scoring defender in the history of the Chinese
national team. She competed in the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, where she was one of just three defenders on Team China to earn a point. She’s a veteran of a dozen IIHF tournaments and was named China’s top player at the 2014, 2017 and 2019 Division 1 Group B world championships.
Yu has also made her mark at the pro level, playing for Kunlun Red Star and the Shenzhen KRS Vanke Rays of the now-defunct Canadian Women’s Hockey League and the Edmonton Chimos of the Western Women’s Hockey League.
“In 2007, I was a young rookie,” Yu said in an interview with iihf.com. “Now I’m the oldest person on the team and am also working as an assistant coach.
“I’m appreciating more every single day I am training with this team. I want my athletes to figure out what their strengths and weaknesses are. Furthermore, I want to provide more individual thinking for my athletes as well. I am willing to let them explore their talent and potential within ice hockey. Most importantly, to enjoy the game and enjoy life.”