Islamabad: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) embassy in Pakistan has launched its charity and humanitarian campaign for Ramadan, to assist underprivileged families in Pakistan.
The Ramadan drive includes food packages (monthly rations) for more than 2,000 people in Islamabad and Rawalpindi, Iftar programmes at universities and for disadvantaged people in Balochistan and the distribution of Holy Quran and dates in different regions.
The UAE Ambassador to Pakistan, Hamad Obaid Ebrahim Al Za’abi, said the project is part of the embassy’s initiatives with charitable and humanitarian foundations as well as Pakistan’s local governments to deliver food to needy families.
This distribution campaign has been launched with the support of Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Humanitarian Foundation to share the spirit of charity in Ramadan as UAE marks Year of Tolerance.
The main distribution programme was held in Islamabad on Friday where more than 2,000 people from Islamabad and twin city Rawalpindi received food packages, each containing a full month’s rations including 20kg of floor, 5kg of oil, 5kg of sugar and other items.
Similar food packages would be distributed throughout the country during the month of Ramadan, the embassy official said.
Pir Noor-ul-Haq Qadri, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony, and Deputy Head of Mission of UAE Abdul Aziz Al Neyadi, distributed the packages, along with other Pakistan and UAE officials.
Expressing gratitude and appreciation on behalf of the Government of Pakistan to the people and leadership of UAE, Noor-ul-Haq said: “The UAE has always helped Pakistan in times of need and has focused on development programmes in infrastructure, health and education sectors, such as building roads and bridges, schools and hospitals and water supply projects in all over Pakistan.”
He added: “all these assistance programmes are based on brotherhood and humanitarian grounds.”
The UAE ambassador praised the generous support of the charitable organisations that provided food and humanitarian assistance to the needy people in Pakistan. Such projects and collaboration would further improve the brotherly and historic relations between Pakistan and UAE, he believed.
Since the beginning of Ramadan, the embassy with generous support from His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, has launched Iftar programme at International Islamic University for the students and Iftar for the disadvantaged people in the Panjgur district of Balochistan province.
Last week, the UAE ambassador’s generous act of gifting a furnished three-bedroom house to a fruit vendor, a widowed mother of four, was highly praised by Pakistanis and many on social media called him a “kindhearted ambassador”.
