November 21, 2003	Friday	Ramazan 25, 1424

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ISLAMABAD, Nov 20: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has planned to establish an international centre in the federal capital to upgrade higher education sector in the country through international linkages.

The centre would not only help promote a scientific culture in the country, but also provide young scientists access to opportunities to listen to outstanding scholars like Noble laureates in science and technology who would be invited to deliver lectures here.

The centre would work on the lines of International Centre of Theoretical Physics (ICTP), Trieste, Italy; India International Centre, New Delhi and AIT Centre Bangkok, Thailand.

The plan aims at establishing an elite institution for the promotion of scientific research to provide a forum to discuss agenda for identifying areas of strategic importance for the country in higher education.

This will provide an opportunity to the budding scientists and engineers to know the contemporary and future directions of research and will help them build networking and personal contacts with leading researchers.

The centre will also help in achieving the objectives of the National Education Policy (1998-2010), Education Sector Reforms (2001-2004), Three Years Development Plan (2001-2004), Perspective Plan (2001-2011) and other relevant policies in science and technology, information technology, agriculture, energy, transportation, etc.

The objectives of the HEC International Centre include promotion of dissemination of state-of-the-art knowledge in science and technology and to provide interaction of the best brains by bringing internationally eminent scientists to visit Pakistan and discuss cutting-edge developments in science and technology with the best potential young scientists in Pakistan.

The centre will also organize and hold preparatory schools, training schools and workshops in various science disciplines of the current research interest for budding scientists. It will also hold longer duration workshops for identifying research issues in various fields of science and technology and mobilize efforts to initiate work on such issues.

It will also provide a forum for international linkage to young scientists with key persons/scholars from abroad and extend help to the R&D institutions and universities in Pakistan to undertake and participate in activities for the promotion of science and technology.

As a result of this project, researchers will get a better environment to be able to do research having state of the art facilities, comparable with any international research school institution.

This will not only lead to economic development of the country, but also provide leadership in science and technology related research fields.