Moscow, SANA-The Russian St. Petersburg University of Humanities commemorated Wednesday the Knowledge Day, with the participation of Russian and foreign parliamentarians, diplomats, scientists and artists.
Knowledge Day, often simply called 1 of September, is the day when the school year traditionally starts in Russia and many other former Soviet republics.
Figures who attended the festivity stressed the importance of science, culture and knowledge in an age of scientific and technological progress that is taking the world by storm.
They indicated that the current clashes, military confrontations, killings and breach of human values are “symptoms of the lack of knowledge that some suffer from.”
Addressing an audience of university professors and students, Syria’s ambassador to Russia Riyad Haddad, who attended the festivity, said: “Today, we are here in this city; the capital of human culture, celebrating the day of knowledge that should garner an international consensus if we want our world free of clashes and bloodshed.”
As he underscored the importance of the new college inaugurated at the Russian university, which teaches international crises-solving, Haddad pointed to the Syrian government’s decision to teach the Russian language at Syrian universities and scho
The ambassador bemoaned the current stage which “is bereft of dialogue that was superseded by a culture of power, violence and attempts to annul the sovereignty of nations under numerous pretexts.”
Haddad pointed to an American strategy that has focused since 1980s on a key strategic goal that the US had set which is, he said, “for the 21st century to be an American par excellence” whose prime manifestations have been a policy of double standards, bullying nations and reserving the right to fight terrorism on its territories while backing it elsewhere.