Dalian, a port city and a tourism destination in northeast China's Liaoning Province, will hold an international sandbeach cultural festival beginning Saturday, vice mayor Wang Chengmin said.

The festival, which is expected to last one month, features a French cultural week, an Italian cultural week, sandbeach football and volleyball matches and two sand sculpture contests, one for professionals and one for amateurs.

The assistant mayor said that officials from the French and Italian embassies in Beijing and cultural and sports professionals from Australia, Bangladesh, Japan, the Republic of Korea (ROK) and Thailand participated in the design and preparation work for the festival.

(Xinhua News Agency, July 16, 2004)