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Following is the transcript (English portion) of remarks by the Chief Executive, Mr Donald Tsang, at a meet-the-media session in Chengdu, Sichuan this afternoon (June 28):
Reporter: Mr Tsang, how do you feel after talking to the survivors?
Chief Executive: I've just visited one of the townships which is in Pengzhou and I feel rather overwhelmed. I've seen rather sad scenes on television of human misery. But coming in to look at it, in terms of scale of the disaster that has caused, it is, to me, quite dramatic. You know the Hong Kong people wish very much to participate in the rebuilding and reconstruction work. It's not only the Government but also private sector, voluntary agencies, and in fact, most people in Hong Kong. The purpose of my trip is to discuss with the provincial leadership in what way Hong Kong can help. We have now organised ourselves already under the chairmanship of the Chief Secretary (for Administration) dividing up various type of work, including engineering work, community help, social welfare work, health, and as well as education and retraining scheme. Hopefully we'll pull together the government resources, private sector resources to do some, hopefully, very useful work in the rebuilding of Sichuan, enabling Hong Kong to understand more about our own nation, and hope through this exercise, Sichuan people and mainland people understand the patriotism of Hong Kong people. Thank you very much. I'll be seeing you later this evening after I meet the provincial leadership and I'll make a further report to you.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Saturday, June 28, 2008
Issued at HKT 18:48
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