Pakistani Mini Invasion of China?

[Riaz Haq]

Mid-1960s America saw a phenomenon called the "British Invasion". Anecdotal evidence suggests similar phenomenon, albeit on a smaller scale, is occurring in China with about 100,000 Pakistanis arriving there in recent years. While the growing presence of the Chinese in Pakistan gets a lot of press, there has been relatively little coverage of the movement of people in the other direction---from Pakistan to China. Jalil Shaikh, a Pakistani-American tech executive in Silicon Valley, has observed this phenomenon during his frequent visits to Jiangsu province in China. Jalil is often welcomed as "iron brother" by the people he meets during his stays in China.

Pakistanis in Changzhou, China

Pakistanis in Changzhou:

Jalil saw anecdotal of evidence of "Pakistani invasion" of China in the city of Changzhou in Jiangsu province. Changzhou has a population of about 5 million people which makes it a medium size city by Chinese standards. Changzhou is an educational hub and is home to several universities, including Changzhou University, Hohai University (Changzhou campus), Jiangsu Teachers' University of Science and Technology, Jiangsu Teachers' University of Technology, and Changzhou Institute of Technology. It attracts a large number of foreign students mainly from countries participating in China's BRI (Belt and Road Initiative). China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is a flagship project of BRI.  There are an estimated 22,000 Pakistani students studying in China. A significant fraction of these students receive Chinese government scholarships to study in the country.

Pakistani Restaurant in Changzhou, China

Pakistanis in Beijing:

Jalil has also travelled to the Chinese capital Beijing for business. During one such trips, he stayed at Oak Chateau hotel where he met dozens of Pakistanis working as engineers. They work as IT engineers at German automakers BMW and Mercedes whose Beijing offices are located just across the street from this hotel.

Food and Music at Changzhou Restaurant: 

On a visit to Changzhou last year, Jalil ate at MandS Restaurant,  a Pakistani restaurant in the city of Changzou. He met its Pakistani owner and several young Pakistanis attending universities there. He learned that here are scores of Pakistanis in Changzou and most of them are reachable on a WeChat  group. WeChat is a ubiquitous smartphone application similar to WhatsApp that serves as both mobile messaging and payment platform. Owned by Chinese social media giant TenCents, WeChat competes with China's e-commerce behemoth Alibaba's Alipay in mobile payments space which has rapidly grown in China.  Jalil joined the Pakistani WeChat group in Changzhou and invited its members to dinner and Karaoke singing at MandS Restaurant. About 40 Pakistanis, mostly students, showed up. Many of the Changzhou Pakistanis, including girls, are from families living in small towns and villages in Pakistan. Many get fully funded scholarships with full tuition, room and board as well as a monthly stipend of 1,700 RMB for Master's degree students and 2,000 RMB for PhD candidates. China gets the benefit of the research work and publications produced by them.

Spinal Injury:

A Pakistani girl who had recently arrived had a serious mishap soon after arrival from her village near Multan. She slipped and fell. The fall caused serious spinal injuries requiring hospitalization and surgery. This occurred before her medical coverage started. The hospital demanded payment of RMB 35,000 which is equivalent to US$5,000. Pakistanis helped raise $4,000 and Jalil made up the difference to cover the unfortunate girl's medical expenses.

Muslims in Changzhou:

A large number of Muslims call Changzhou home. There are 5 mosques in the city.  Jalil has had the opportunity to attend Friday prayers at packed mosques in the city.  MandS Restaurant owner offered free meals to over 200 Muslims as part of Eid Milad un Nabi (Prophet Mohammad SAW's birthday)celebration last year.

China-Pakistan Ties:

Pakistan-China ties are rapidly growing well beyond the economy and the military with tens of thousands of Chinese and Pakistani citizens regularly traveling between the two countries.

More Pakistanis than ever are learning the Chinese language. China with its world class educational institutions is emerging as one of the top destinations for Pakistanis studying abroad. China-Pakistan relationship is becoming a truly multi-dimensional strategic relationship.   This new phenomenon is the subject of a Pakistani spice company television commercial featuring a young Chinese woman in Lahore making the popular biryani dish using Shan masala.

China's Strides in Science and Technology:

Why is China becoming a fast growing destination for foreign students, including Pakistanis studying abroad? A story in India's "The Wire" online magazine has explained it in terms of the rapid rate of China's progress in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) fields as follows:

America's National Science Foundation and National Science Board have recently released their biennial science and engineering indicators which provide detailed figures on research and development (R&D), innovation and engineers. But its true message is in a different direction, “China has become,” concludes Robert J. Samuelson in a column, “or is in the verge of becoming – a scientific and technical superpower. This is not entirely unexpected given the size of the Chinese economy and its massive investments in R&D, even so, he says, “the actual numbers are breathtaking”.

1. China is the 2nd largest spender in R&D after the US, accounting for 21% of the world total which is $2 trillion. It has been going up 18% a year, as compared to 4% in the US. An OECD report says that China could overtake the US in R&D spending by 2020.

2. China has overtaken the US in terms of total number of science publications. Technical papers have increased dramatically, even if their impact, as judged by citation indices, may not be that high.

3. The US continues to produce more PhDs and attract more foreign students. But new international enrollment at US colleges was down for the first time in the decade in 2017. The Trump administration’s anti-immigration rhetoric and actions are scaring away students.

4. China has begun shifting from being an assembler of high-tech components, to a maker of super computers and aircraft and given the pattern of its investments in RandD and technology development, it is focusing on becoming the world leader in artificial intelligence (AI), quantum communications, quantum computing, biotechnology and electric vehicles.

Summary:

While the growing presence of the Chinese in Pakistan gets a lot of press, there has been relatively little coverage of the movement of people in the other direction---from Pakistan to China. Pakistan-China ties are rapidly growing well beyond the economy and the military with tens of thousands of Chinese and Pakistani citizens regularly traveling between the two countries. Jalil Shaikh, a Pakistani-American tech executive in Silicon Valley, has observed this phenomenon during his frequent visits to Jiangsu province in China. Jalil is often welcomed as "iron brother" by the people he meets during his stays in China.  More Pakistanis than ever are learning the Chinese language.  China with its world class educational institutions is emerging as one of the top destinations for Pakistanis studying abroad. It is becoming a truly multi-dimensional relationship which will help Pakistan rise with China on the world stage.

Here's a video clip of Karaoke Dinner in Changzhou, China:

https://youtu.be/2YSnDGtVjsk

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[Riaz Haq]

6th Academic Forum on China-Pakistan Scientific, Technical and Economic Cooperation held

http://en.ce.cn/Insight/202111/28/t20211128_37121821.shtml


“This year marks the 70th anniversary of the establishment of Pak-China diplomatic ties and there has been a renewed focus on cooperation in the fields of higher education and science and technology. Realizing the importance of higher education, science and technology, and innovation, both countries had taken great initiatives or cooperation in these fields," Mr. Moin ul Haque, Pakistani Ambassador to China highlighted on the 6th Academic Forum on China-Pakistan Scientific, Technical and Economic Cooperation under the “Belt and Road” Initiative held on Saturday.

In 1976, Pakistan and China signed an agreement on scientific and technical cooperation and so far under this agreement, 18 protocols of bilateral scientific and technological corporations have been implemented. Now both sides are working on formulating the 19th protocol. The ambassador explained that the 19th protocol would focus on emerging technologies in the areas of smart agriculture, nanotechnology, environmental protection, energy conservation, and storage system design.

As CPEC moves to industrialization and high-quality development, China-Pakistan cooperation in the fields of higher education and science and technology assumes greater importance and will have a new dimension. The Ambassador suggested both countries intensify institutional linkages between academic and research institutions to do focus research and provide guidance to industries businessmen on engaging and emerging trends in technologies.

Mr. Xie Guoxiang, Minister Counselor, Embassy of China in Pakistan underlined that scientific, technological, and economic cooperation and exchanges are an important part of omni-directional, multi-field and in-depth exchanges and cooperation between China and Pakistan. The intergovernmental scientific and technological cooperation mechanisms including CPEC JWG on science and technology have guided the direction and gathered strength for deepening cooperation in scientific and technological innovation between the two countries.

Mr. Xie Guoxiang further maintained that "China will do its best to firmly support Pakistan to embark on a development path in line with its national conditions and firmly support Pakistan's grand vision of realizing a 'new Pakistan'."

Dr. Talat Shabbir, China-Pakistan Study Centre (CPSC), Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad (ISSI), and Dr. Di Yuna, Dr. Di Yuna, Executive Director of BTBU PSC, signed the memorandum of academic cooperation on behalf of both sides.

Mr. Wang Zihai, Honorary Investment Counselor of Pakistan, President of Pakistan China Chamber of Commerce and Industry, mentioned that CPEC is not only the game changer for Pakistan but also a major project to change the regional situation. Mutual benefit and win-win results can be achieved by actively attracting other SCO member states to participate in CPEC construction.

As part of the forum, BRI Youth Forum has received a total of 45 contributions from postgraduates from 24 universities/institutions. Excellent papers are selected by the evaluation experts, and 15 students are approved to give speeches at the forum.

The forum was guided by the Department of International Cooperation, China Association for Science and Technology (CAST), Beijing Association for Science and Technology (BAST), Embassy of China in Pakistan, Embassy of Pakistan Beijing, and jointly organized by Beijing Technology and Business University (BTBU), Pakistan Science Foundation (PSF) and ECO Science Foundation (ECOSF).

[Riaz Haq]

Chinese views of the world at the time of the Russia-Ukraine war Evidence from a March 2022 public opinion survey

https://ceias.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/CN-poll-report-final_ma...

The Central European Institute of Asian Studies (CEIAS) is an independent think tank based in Bratislava (Slovakia), and with branches in Olomouc (Czech Republic), and Vienna (Austria).

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Russia turned out to be the most positively perceived country by the Chinese respondents (see Figure 1). Asked to rate their feelings toward 25 countries on a scale of 0-100, 79.8% of respondents said they viewed Russia in a positive light while only 12% held negative views. It seems clear, then, that Chinese positive attitudes towards Russia were not disturbed by the Russia-Ukraine war. Quite the opposite, as Figure 2 shows, almost 80% of respondents reported that their views of Russia had improved over the last three years.8 This finding is broadly consistent with past survey results between 2008 and 2015, which found only around 50% of Chinese respondents held positive views of Russia.

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The other very positively perceived countries among Chinese respondents were Pakistan (73%), Singapore (66%), North Korea (62%), and Germany (61%). In turn, other very negatively perceived countries included India (56%), Japan (54%), Vietnam (48%), South Korea (47%) and Ukraine (46%). 15 Few if any previously published polls have asked Chinese respondents their views of Ukraine, but prior to Russia’s invasion, Ukrainian opinion appears to have been far more positive towards China than the reverse

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The US was the most negatively viewed country in China with slightly more than 60% of respondents perceiving it negatively and 31% holding positive attitudes. India was the second-most poorly evaluated country, with nearly 58% negative views, followed by Japan with 55%. Figure 3 also suggests that perceptions of the US have significantly deteriorated recently: almost 60% of the Chinese respondents stated their perception of the US had worsened over the past three years. Interestingly, in the case of Japan, about the same proportion of respondents (36% in both cases) reported that their views had improved and worsened over the same time period 

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Russia also appeared to be one of the most recommended countries for pursuing higher education among the Chinese, behind only China itself (83%), Singapore (56%), and the United Kingdom (55%). More than 52% of respondents recommended university study in Russia (see Figure 11), while India and South Korea were the least recommended countries for university studies, with 63% and 42% of respondents not recommending them respectively

[Riaz Haq]

Why us? #India’s tired, depressed, stranded #students desperate for #China return. The #Chinese has allowed small batches of students from other #Asian countries such as #Pakistan and #SriLanka to return but Indian students remain stranded. https://sc.mp/zq7x?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=share_widget&a... via @scmpnews


Around 20,000 Indian students are enrolled in Chinese universities, with the vast majority studying medicine due to a similar curriculum
But they have been forced to study online due to the coronavirus, and despite assurances, they face an anxious wait to find out when they can return

Shahroz Khan was in his third year at Nantong University College of Medicine when the coronavirus pandemic first struck China and he decided to fly back to India.
Over the next two and half years, for complex, senior-level courses such as surgery, orthopaedics, and ophthalmology, online demonstrations replaced hands-on, practical learning in clinical laboratories and hospitals.
“Of course we feel this loss,” said 23-year-old Khan from Delhi. “We should have been there and we should have been able to gain this knowledge physically. That feeling will be there throughout our lives.”
Khan, though, continued to pay 1,700 yuan (US$252) per month in rent, having moved to Nantong in September 2017, hoping he would be allowed to return to China to resume his practical studies and be reunited with his belongings.
The owner had to just throw our things because we lost our hope to return
Shahroz Khan
But in March, with only three months left until the end of his fifth year and the start of his final year internship, he finally gave up the flat.

“The owner had to just throw our things because we lost our hope to return,” said Khan, who is the student coordinator for Indian Students in China and also the Foreign Medical Graduates Parents’ Association.
“Each semester we thought China might call us back, but the students have become tired and depressed.”
Around 20,000 Indian students are enrolled in Chinese universities, according to India’s Ministry of External Affairs in May. The vast majority are studying medicine because of the similarity in curriculums between the two countries and the affordability of Chinese medical universities, compared to private Indian institutions.

The rest of the world has opened its borders to international students again, and while China has allowed small batches of students from other Asian countries such as Pakistan and Sri Lanka to return, Indian students remain stranded

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The financial burden of transferring to another foreign medical institute is almost the same as the financial burden of resuming studies in China again, she said.
Quarantine and flight costs could be as high as 4-5 lakh rupees (US$5,000-US$6,300), while Rachita Kurmi may also be asked by her university to pay for an additional year to allow her to catch up on clinical learning.
But despite the hurdles, students such as Rachita Kurmi and Ridhi, who still have at least three years left before they complete their degrees, continue to hope that they might be able to return soon.
“What we really want is for China to open up,” added Rachita Kurmi. “We were there for so long, it was almost like a second home.”

[Riaz Haq]

‘Chow Yun-fat of Pakistan’: Hong Kong ethnic minority boy, 10, tipped for stardom by iconic city actor Anthony Wong after film awards win

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/china-personalities/articl...

Pakistan-born youngster, Sahal Zaman, was presented with Best New Performer Award by Oscar-winning actress, Michelle Yeoh
Veteran Hong Kong actor Anthony Wong says the 10-year-old has the potential to become the Chow Yun-fat of the country of his birth


Veteran Hong Kong movie star Anthony Wong Chau-sang has heaped praise on groundbreaking child actor Sahal Zaman who recently won the Best New Performer Award at the Hong Kong Film Awards.

Zaman, 10, is the first South Asian in Hong Kong cinema history to win the accolade, doing so for his leading performance alongside Wong in the film, The Sunny Side of the Street.


To top off his success, Zaman was presented with the award by Michelle Yeoh, who had just won Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Everything Everywhere All At Once, and is the first Asian actress to win an Oscar.
Receiving the award, Zaman said he was delighted and hoped that Hong Kong audiences would go to cinemas to support his film.

Later, in an interview, he said that he wanted to eat pizza to celebrate and would continue working hard to take on more roles.

Previously, Zaman won the Best New Performer Award from the Hong Kong Film Directors’ Guild.
The Sunny Side of the Street tells the story of Hassan, a young Pakistani refugee, and a taxi driver played by iconic Hong Kong actor, Wong.
When Hassan’s father is killed in a car accident, the driver who had sneaked into Hong Kong in the 1970s befriends the boy.

In 2022, Wong won Best Leading Actor at Taiwan’s Golden Horse Awards for his role in the film.


At the time, he brought Zaman on stage with him, where Zaman broke down in tears.

In an interview after that, Wong tipped Zaman to become “Pakistan’s Chow Yun-fat”. Chow is one of Hong Kong’s most famous actors ever.
Zaman said he planned to bring Wong on stage with him if he won at the Hong Kong Film Awards, but when he gestured to Wong as he headed to the stage Wong said: “No need to bring me. You go on stage by yourself.”
Born in Pakistan, Zaman settled in Hong Kong with his father before starting primary school.
In an interview with Hong Kong newspaper AM730, the Malaysian director of The Sunny Side of the Street, Lau Kok Rui, said that in preparation for the film, the cast went around primary schools and ethnic minority centres across the city looking for children who could speak both Cantonese and Urdu and selected 12 candidates from about 200 children.
After auditioning and acting training, the cast eventually chose Zaman.
“He has a great personality, knows how to communicate with everyone and is not afraid of adults and does not hide away. He had no stage fright when we started filming and quickly integrated into the cast,” said Lau.
Zaman is in Primary Five and lives in the Kwai Chung district of the city’s New Territories.

[Riaz Haq]

China is a top destination for Pakistani students with some 28,000 Pakistani students studying in China. China has received returning Pakistani students with a warm welcome, facilitating them to continue their studies with same zeal and enthusiasm.


https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/1060100-china-top-destination-for-...


After three years of break-off due to the pandemic, Waseem Abbas, a Pakistani student pursuing his doctoral degree in China, finally returned to Beijing together with some 20 fellow students at the beginning of April to continue study in a prominent Chinese university.

“It’s inspiring to see everything goes back to normal on a safe basis”, he said, adding, “From boarding to getting off the plane, hailing taxes and entering campus, we go on unhindered, China Economic Net (CEN) reported on Wednesday. He told that there is a surge in the number of Pakistani students returning to China after the country lifted its Covid-related restrictions on inbound visitors at the beginning of this year. In the past two years, while lab research was suspended partly, his quest for knowledge did not. Together with his supervisors and classmates, he published seven papers on feed additives and one SCI-indexed paper is in the pipeline.

Moreover, by working part-time with a Chinese feed technology company that has presence in Pakistan, he paved the way for working in Beijing after graduation as he wishes. “In Pakistan, livestock production contributes over 60% of the total agricultural output value. Around 60% of our feed additives, an essential element for livestock health, are imported from China. After the floods last year, they have a significant role to play in recovering Pakistan’s poultry sector”, he said.