The 6th Asian Arts Festival opened in this capital city of northeast China's Jilin Province Sunday afternoon. Artists from 17 Asian countries participated in the event.

The opening ceremony, a parade, attracted an audience of 10,000,with artists from Bangladesh, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Philippine, Malaysia and Sri Lanka gathering to perform folk songs and dances.

Meng Xiaosi, Vice Minister of Culture, said in the opening ceremony that Asian countries created splendid civilization, which made remarkable contribution to the development of human civilization.

The Asian Arts Festival not only provided a good opportunity for the artists to learn from each other, but also showed the prosperity of Asian culture and the closer ties among peoples of Asian countries, Meng said.

Since Aug. 18, a total of 19 Asian artistic troupes have performed in Beijing and Changchun. Later the tour will perform in Jilin city, Songyuan and Yanbian, major cities of Jilin province.

Zhou Weijie, head of the Culture Bureau of the Jilin provincial government, said the arts festival will include a film show and some exhibitions along with performances by foreign artistic troupes.

The Asian Arts Festival, an annual event beginning from 1998, has so far attracted 80 artistic troupes from 22 Asian countries. 

(Xinhua News Agency August 23, 2004)