Israeli Minister-Counselor to China Amram Arie Olmert said in
Harbin Thursday he appreciated China's work to preserve Jewish
culture.
After visiting his grandfather's and other relatives' tombs in
the Huangshan Jewish graveyard in this capital city of northeast
China's Heilongjiang
Province, he extended his thanks to the Chinese government and
the Harbin local government for their contribution to the
protection of Jewish cultural relics.
The protection of historic relics played an important role in
the general development of a country, he said, emphasizing that the
young generation should be well informed of the international and
domestic history.
Liu Jun, in charge of the management of the graveyard, said the
graveyard was the biggest of its kind in the Far East, and had
aroused attention from Jewish people and Jewish culture experts
worldwide.
According to Qu Wei, director of the Jewish Research Center
under the Heilongjiang Academy of Social Sciences, the Jewish
people spent nearly a century in Harbin, forming an integrated
Jewish community with the population surpassing 20,000.
The Jewish culture relics preserved in Harbin has been a
prominent part of the Jewish culture heritage worldwide, he
said.
An Israeli delegation headed by Israeli ambassador to China
Yehoyada Haim visited Harbin to discuss with the governmental
officials and entrepreneurs the issues concerned with cultural
exchanges and agricultural cooperation.
(Xinhua News Agency November 7, 2003)