TASHKENT, Aug. 18 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese volunteer medical team launched a charitable eye care program in the Uzbek cities of Tashkent and Kokand on Monday, offering free cataract surgeries to locals.
At the launch ceremony, Elmira Basitkhanova, adviser to Uzbekistan's health minister, said that Chinese ophthalmologists have performed thousands of cataract surgeries in the country since 2019, helping Uzbek patients restore their sight and improve their quality of life.
Restoring a person's vision means rekindling hope in their heart, said Tursunali Kuziev, an adviser to the director of the Islamic Civilization Center in Uzbekistan. "The friendship between the peoples of Uzbekistan and China is strengthened and deepened through such warm, genuine and humanitarian acts," he said.
Zhang Hongping, one of the initiators of the charity program and chairwoman of an international enterprise based in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, said she would continue to support the program so that more people in countries along the Belt and Road could benefit.
The program, co-organized by Chinese enterprises and the charity federation of Kuitun city in Xinjiang, will run for several days. A team of ophthalmologists and volunteers from China will screen at least 150 cataract patients in Uzbekistan and perform 100 free surgeries. ■