Chinese culture festival for Spring Festival held in Sri Lanka

COLOMBO, Jan. 20 (Xinhua) -- Sri Lankan Prime Minister Harini Amarasuriya attended the opening ceremony of "Happy Chinese New Year · Chinese Culture Festival" held here on Sunday.

In her speech, Amarasuriya said China has been a steadfast partner in Sri Lanka's development journey, supporting Sri Lanka in times of need and standing by the South Asian country in its efforts to achieve economic stability and prosperity.

Chinese Ambassador to Sri Lanka Qi Zhenhong said that in recent years, the Chinese Spring Festival has increasingly gone to the world, becoming a window for the world to better understand Chinese culture and customs, and an important way to promote exchanges and mutual learning among different civilizations.

He said China and Sri Lanka are good brothers and partners who help each other. China is willing to work with Sri Lanka to implement the important consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen the strategic cooperative partnership, promote high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and jointly build a China-Sri Lanka community with a shared future, bringing more benefits to the two countries and their peoples.

Approximately 800 guests, including high-level officials of the Sri Lankan government, overseas Chinese, and Chinese enterprise representatives, attended the opening ceremony.