1 Sep : The Chief Minister of Nagaland Neiphiu Rio, as a member of the Organising Committee of the 2010 Commonwealth Games, to be held in New Delhi, visited Beijing to witness the Olympic Games with the clearance of the Government of India.
Addressing a press conference today the 1st September 2008, at his residential office, Rio disclosed that he had witnessed a number of Olympic events. “The experience of the visit to Beijing will enable us to learn from others on all fronts especially in smooth conduct of the sports events and in managing the logistics that are directly and indirectly related to the Commonwealth Games”, he said. The Chief Minister said that it was a good experience to see things organized in a perfect manner and further pointed out that he was impressed by the smooth traffic system.
On his visit to Tokyo, Neiphiu Rio said that he was hosted at the International House of Japan for breakfast by the Advisor/Director of the International House, Hiroshi Matsumoto, who is also the Director of Japan-India Association. They discussed India-Japan relations and both felt the need to increase cultural relations through people to people contact, he informed.
The Chief Minister said that, in Korea it was more like a home-coming, where his team were received at the Incheon International Airport by representative of Cona International led by Rev. Moon and Naga students presently studying in Korea with the song ‘God Bless my Nagaland’.
Rio informed that he met member of the National Assembly, (Congressman) Choi, Jae Sung where they discussed the proposal of the Nagaland Government to send youth to work in Korea under various projects. He also disclosed about his meeting with the Korean Union Minister for Labour, Lee Young Hee where proposal to send Naga youth to work in Korea for Korean firms was discussed elaborately.
Rio also informed about his meeting with the Cultural, Sports and Tourism officials where he requested them to extend its expertise and assistance on the field of sports particularly in discipline like Archery, Taekwondo, Badminton and Athletics for Nagaland.
On meeting with Korea’s Global T.V. Arirang, which was attended by the President and CEO of Arirang, Chung Kuk Lok and other officials, it discussed the details of the forthcoming Korea-India Music festival to be hosted by Nagaland on 2nd December 2008. The Chief Minister of Nagaland also met officials of Cona International and discussed various development projects.
On the present NU crisis in Nagaland, Rio said that the academic career of the students should not be affected and felt that a solution has to be found out by the NUTA and NU officials. Rio admitted about the bad road condition in the state, and said that fund constraints, soil condition, and heavy monsoon are the factors for our poor road conditions but assured that the government is on the job to improve things.