KARACHI, June 17: The HEJ Research Institute of Chemistry, University of Karachi, will conduct research works in various fields of chemistry in collaboration with Malaysian scientists.

This was stated by the acting director of the institute, Dr Iqbal Choudhary at a press briefing held at the inauguration of a five-day Pak-Malaysia bi-national workshop at the HEJ institute on Tuesday. He said that the institute, which had now upgraded to the status of an international Centre for Chemical Sciences, had almost finalized the work frame for collaborative research programmes. Under these programmes, students and staff of the HEJ institute and those from Malaysian varsities would visit each other to cooperate in research works.

He said that such collaborations would be for the first time in the filed of chemistry between the two countries. A faculty member of HEJ would soon be visiting Malaysia to conduct collaborative research, he informed.

Dr Choudhary said that the institute, established in 1967 by late Prof Salimuzzaman Siddiqui, was currently producing 18 PhD graduates annually. He said that the HEJ was the only institute in Pakistan, which had sustained world class scientific research. He informed the newsmen that the government had recently nominated the HEJ institute as UNESCO Regional Centres of Excellence.

While claiming that the institute had made revolutionary progress during the limited time period and budget under the leadership of Dr Atta-ur-Rehman, he said that only last year the institute produced 175 research papers of international repute, while about 200 scientists from different countries had visited the institute.

He informed that there had been a gap in the routine visit of German students to the institute in view of the changing world scenario and development in the region. However, he added that as many as six Germans would again be visiting the institute next month for collaborative research. Students and scientists from France were also willing to come to the institute, he added.