First Shanghai Middle East Studies Forum held

The first Shanghai Middle East Studies Forum was held in Shanghai on June 10, themed “The Relationship Between China and the Middle East from the Perspective of Regional and Country Studies.”

Liu Zhongmin, director of the Middle East Studies Institute at Shanghai International Studies University, said that China’s Middle East studies need to boost theoretical and methodology consciousness, break disciplinary barriers and achieve interdisciplinary research. China’s Middle East Studies research institutions should adopt the development path of diversified competition along with collaboration, Liu said.

Existing achievements in national history studies of the Middle East cannot satisfy the current demands of the “Belt and Road” initiative, said Wang Tiezheng, professor from the Institute of Middle Eastern Studies at Northwest University and vice-chairman of China Middle East Society, adding that It is necessary to constantly deepen and expand studies of national history in the Middle East and intensify the monographic research in events of major Middle Eastern countries.

Located in the joint zone of the “Belt and Road,” Middle Eastern countries are China’s natural partners in jointly building the “Belt and Road.”

The implementation of the “Belt and Road” should organically connect with development demands of Middle Eastern countries. Thus, basic investigation and research on economic and social conditions and development strategy of these countries need to be strengthened. Governments, think tanks and enterprises should make great efforts to map out the blueprint of the co-built “Belt and Road” according to regions and countries, said Li Chengwen, affairs ambassador of China-Arab States Cooperation Forum of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and China’s former ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

The forum was co-hosted by the Middle East Studies Institute at Shanghai International Studies University, the China Middle East Society, the Institute of International Studies at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, the Center for West Asian and North African Studies at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, the Shanghai International Relations Society, and the Center for Turkish Studies at Shanghai University.