On May 27, 2024, Ding Kuiling, the President of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, met with H.E. Ahmad Belhoul AlFalasi, the Minister of Education of the United Arab Emirates, and his delegation at the Minhang Campus. H.E. Muhannad Alnaqbi, Consul General of the United Arab Emirates in Shanghai, accompanied the visit. Representatives from the Office of International Cooperation and Exchange, the Graduate School, the Student Affairs Office, and relevant academic departments attended the meeting.

Ding Kuiling welcomed Farahi and his delegation and briefly introduced the history and development of SJTU and its educational cooperation with Arab countries in recent years. He pointed out that the UAE, as the first Arab country to establish a strategic partnership with China, is a solid partner of China in promoting the China-Arab community of destiny and the construction of ‘Belt and Road’ in the Gulf region. This year is the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the UAE, and the bilateral relations are in the golden era of the century-old plan, as China-Arab co-operation has borne fruitful results in the past 40 years. Against the background of the UAE's economic and intellectual transformation in the ‘post-oil era’ and China's achievement of the dual-carbon goal, we believe that the two sides can open up a broad space for cooperation in cross-disciplinary fields, such as sustainable energy, environmental engineering, artificial intelligence, etc., so as to cultivate top-notch talents who can cope with global issues and have an international outlook and the ability to communicate cross-culturally. 

In addition, Cheng Jinhua, Associate Dean of Graduate School, Kong Lingxun, Associate Dean of Michigan College, and Cai Wenjing, Associate Dean of College of Humanities, made introductions of relevant international students and colleges.

As the first stop of his visit to China, Farahi said he was honoured to visit Jiao Tong University and highly appreciated the university's fruitful work in international exchange and cooperation, and had a preliminary understanding of Jiao Tong University's characteristic engineering platforms of English-medium programmes, Chinese language programmes, short-term non-degree programmes and scholarships. He hoped that the two sides would explore more practical cooperation in the cultivation of top talents, international student enrollment, faculty exchanges and scientific research; in recent years, there has been a boom in Chinese language learning in the UAE, so he hoped that more students from the UAE could study in Jiaotong University; in addition, in the two frontier areas of sustainable development and artificial intelligence, he hoped that relying on Jiaotong University's strong basic research disciplines and excellent scientific research and technological platforms, the two sides could make efforts and mutually promote each other's cooperation, so that both sides could make efforts and promote each other's cooperation in the same direction. In addition, in the two frontier areas of sustainable development and artificial intelligence, we hope that both sides can work in the same direction, promote each other, and seek breakthroughs in co-operation at more levels. 

After the meeting, the delegation also visited the University History Museum and exchanged views with UAE students.