The Chinese embassy in Cairo is discussing with Egypt’s Ministry of Education the possibility of teaching the Chinese language in Egyptian schools, the Education Counselor at the Chinese embassy in Egypt, Song Bo, told Daily News Egypt, on the sidelines of the conference that the embassy held last Thursday in the presence of newly appointed ambassador Liao Liqiang.
“We believe Egypt is a major nation in the world. We want to add the Chinese language among foreign languages in Egyptian schools,” Bo mentioned, noting that many other countries teach Chinese at schools.
The discussions are only about the schools because teaching Chinese at the universities is going very well, Bo asserted, adding, “we fully understand that Arabic is the mother tongue and English is the first foreign language. We don’t want to compete with English, we just hope to be the same level of the European languages as Spanish, German, and Italian.”
“I have a very strong desire to help Egyptian people to learn the Chinese language,” the Chinese ambassador mentioned over his speech, praising the Emirate authorities that pay increasing attention to learning Chinese language to the Emirate people.
Additionally, the ambassador said that his country pays attention to building capacity of the Egyptian youth, noting that about 616 Egyptian young people travelled to China last year to attend training courses.
