China's First Lady attends UNESCO award ceremony

Xiamen: First Lady of China and UNESCO Special Envoy Peng Liyuan on Tuesday awarded the UNESCO Prize for Girls' and Women's Education to three representatives of the award-winning projects during a ceremony here.

The participants also included wives of delegation heads to the 9th BRICS summit and the Dialogue of Emerging Market and Developing Countries held in the southeastern Xiamen city.

At Xiamen University, Peng and UNESCO (UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) Director-General Irina Bokova awarded the prize to three winners who hailed from Thailand, Peru and South Africa.

The prize was established in October 2015 to honour outstanding contributions made by individuals, institutions, non-governmental organisations or other entities engaged in advancing girls? and women?s education.

Peng, the wife of President Xi Jinping and also special envoy of UNESCO for the promotion of girls' and women's education, said valuing education is a fine tradition of the Chinese nation.

"We should offer help to women and children in need, and enable them to have the opportunities and capacity to change their fate and live a better life," said Peng.

She hopes that the BRICS countries, other developing countries and the rest of the world will make joint efforts in promoting the development of women's and children's education, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Wives of the presidents of South Africa, Guinea and Mexico, and the prime minister of Thailand, attended the ceremony.