Kathmandu, May 18
Prof Dr. Rajiv Kumar Jha has been appointed the Civil Ambassador to Nepal by the Xi’an government of Shanxi Province of the People’s Republic of China. The appointment aims to further strengthen the Nepal-China ties through collaboration and cooperation in the socio-economic and cultural sectors.
Prof Jha associated with the Xi’an Medical University based in Xi’an city, Shanxi Province was appointed to the post on May 16.
There is a tradition of any provincial government in China appointing a foreign national residing in that province for a long period of time and achieving expertise in any field and thus contributing to strengthening ties with other countries.
With his appointment to the post, he said he had proposed to establish a sister-city relationship between the Xi’an Municipality in China and Butwal Sub-metropolis of Nepal which was already accepted by the province government.
In the aftermath of the endorsement of the proposal, Xi’an University of Art and Science, in cooperation with a University in the Butwal Sub-metropolis, will establish ‘Confucius Institute’. For this, a high-level delegation from the Xi’an Municipality University and the University will be visiting Butwal in future.
Last year, he was appointed the ambassador with responsibilities to look after all affairs related to one belt one road in Nepal by the province government. Xi’an city, the hometown of Chinese President Xi Jinping holds the credit for the birth of the concept of Silk Road and the OBOR is the expanded form of Silk Road concept.
Dr. Jha holds the Ph. D. degree in the subject relating to the minimization of pancreas cancer and also received the ‘postdoc’ degree. The Shanxi province government four years ago established the ‘China-Nepal Friendship Medical Research Center of Professor Rajiv Kumar Jha’ in his honor.
The center based in the Xi’an Medical University is centered on the research and study of cancer disease and exchange of mutual experiences of medical sciences. He is a visiting professor at various universities in China.
