Monday, December 16, 2013
Kabul (BNA) In the fourth-day of his official visit to India, President Hamid Karzai attended and delivered a speech as a Special Guest at the Conference of International Relations organized by the Symbiosis International University of India under the theme of “India and Asia-Africa development partnerships towards a new pattern”.
To start with, the students of the University representing 85 countries led by two Afghan students wearing Afghan costumes presented their flags to President Karzai and he placed all the flags in a pottery as a symbol of unity among the world countries.
The ceremony was attended by Shanker Narayan, Governor of Maharashtra State, Dr. S.B Majumdar found and rector of the International University and his deputies and hundreds of students including the Afghan students.
President Hamid Karzai in his speech said that Afghanistan and India maintain historical ancient ties and the relations of the two nations is continuing from ancient times to date and India is one of the greatest donor country in reconstruction of Afghanistan having provided over 2 billion US dollars to the long-term infrastructural projects in Afghanistan.
He added that India assisted Afghanistan in extension of power transmission line from the north of Afghanistan to Kabul, builds up parliament building, rehabilitated Indira Gandhi Child Health Hospital in Kabul and awarded thousands of scholarships to the Afghan students. Recalling that India is also a pioneer country in assisting the education system in Afghanistan, the president added that India has a big role in development of capacities in Afghanistan especially in assisting the education sphere as presently tens of thousands of Afghan students are undergoing training throughout India in different spheres.
He added that we have witnessed the impacts of the Indian aid while the Afghan students are returning to Afghanistan and any students returning after education in India, perform high quality skills for the country.
He stressed that India and Afghanistan have signed a long-term strategic cooperation agreement and they have common interests, opportunities and dangers and they should jointly work for expansion of bilateral relations and cooperation.
It should be stated that the Symbiosis International University is a credible international Indian University where around 3,000 students from 85 countries are receiving education in 45 professions and of the 4000 Afghan students in Poona city of India, most of them are pursuing education in Symbiosis University.
