A monument to the Sino-American friendship was unveiled in this capital city of northwest China's Shaanxi Province Friday to mark the arrival of the 100th service team sent by Global Volunteers to China.

The 100-member team will render volunteer service in Shaanxi for two weeks ending May 22.

Global Volunteers, a private non-profit and non-sectarian development organization, was founded in 1984 with the goal of helping to establish a foundation for peace through mutual international understanding. It sends enthusiastic skilled personnel to various countries for volunteer teaching and for medical and infrastructure construction guidance.

The Global Volunteers organization sent its first batch of seven service teams to Shaanxi, the only region in China, in April 1996. By July 2003, it has sent to Shaanxi 99 service teams which offered legal, medical and oral English teaching and enterprise management training.

All Global Volunteer members who had served in China will have their named engraved on the monument.

Bai Yunteng, chairman of the Shaanxi Provincial People's Congress, and Bud Philbrook, chairman of the Global Volunteers, expressed satisfaction over bilateral cooperation and discussed great prospects in future cooperation. 

(Xinhua News Agency May 24, 2004)