Language, culture key to cooperation, says ambassador

Zheng Zeguang, China's ambassador to the United Kingdom, made his first visit to Northern Ireland on Monday since assuming his position in 2021.

The visit, which was aimed at promoting cultural exchanges and economic cooperation, included a reception at China's consulate-general in Belfast, where Zheng spoke to more than 100 guests representing local government, business and commerce, culture, and education.

"Despite the pandemic, I have been able to travel to Scotland, Wales, and many cities in England. But I saved the best for the last," said Zheng.

The ambassador said, with the optimization of COVID-19 control measures, he is confident many Chinese business delegations, students, and tourists will now resume visits to Northern Ireland.

"And the job for me and my colleagues is to grant more visas in the UK for people to visit China," Zheng said. "We will do whatever we can to promote people-to-people exchanges and cooperation."

Zheng also had a meeting with Christina Black, the lord mayor of Belfast, who said she talked to the ambassador about her experience of visiting Shenyang more than 15 years ago, and about further partnerships and ways of working together.

"I have to say, our relationship with China is fantastic," said Black, who added that she takes great pride in the fact that many Chinese students choose to study at universities in Belfast.

"Also, in terms of tourism, technology, banking, and cyber security, there are lots of avenues for partnership and growth together," she added.

During his visit to Ulster University earlier in the day, Zheng discussed with representatives from the faculty and student population the importance of language learning in building mutual understanding and fostering collaboration.

"Language is so useful and instrumental for the whole world to come together and establish positive and constructive relationships," he said.

The university has hosted Northern Ireland's first and only Confucius Institute since 2012, which provides Chinese language courses and cultural activities to university students and students from more than 160 schools from across Northern Ireland.

Julie Connor, former deputy principal at Ballymena Academy, brought Chinese language learning to the school's curriculum 10 years ago through a partnership with the institute, which enabled grade 8 students to choose Chinese language study in addition to the three European languages on offer.

"We saw a need in the businesses in Ballymena that had links with China," she said. "We felt it's important for pupils to have the opportunity to study Chinese. It can give them some advantage in having a skillset that other people don't have, and language learning develops their communication skills and ability to make connections with other people."

Six students from different schools spoke to the ambassador in Mandarin about their experiences in learning Chinese.

Mia Kearney, a grade 9 student at the academy, said she enjoy learning Chinese calligraphy and paper-cutting, and she said her friends thought it was cool she was learning Chinese.

Zheng encouraged the "young ambassadors" to continue their language learning at higher levels.

"Behind the language, there is the culture, history, and philosophy, and there is lot to learn, just like the more than 220,000 Chinese students in the UK who are interested in learning not only the English language, but also the culture, the history, the philosophy, and about the people," Zheng said.

Mark Durkin, executive dean of the university's business school, echoed the ambassador's comments, saying their partnership with Dongbei University of Finance and Economics in Dalian benefits both Chinese and UK students.

"I think Confucius Institute does much to promote that, in terms of the Chinese culture and language here. But also we're promoting our culture and language … So, I think it all helps us to understand," he said. "Once we understand each other, we can trade and we can exchange, we can create value together."