Egypt’s Minister of Youth and Sports, Ashraf Sobhi, opened on Sunday a semi-Olympic swimming pool and a physical fitness centre at Maadi Youth Centre 77 in southern Cairo.
Accompanying the minister in the opening of the new facilities were Japanese Ambassador to Cairo, Oka Hiroshi, Acting Ambassador of the European Union Delegation to Cairo, Tobias Krause, and Cairo Governor, Khaled Abdel A’al.
The new facilities are part of a series of investment projects launched by the Ministry of Youth and Sports.
After the inauguration of the facilities, the officials present launched the ‘Safety, Empowerment and Protection for Refugees and Host Communities in Egypt: Friendly Spaces in Youth Centres’ project.
The project is implemented by the Ministry of Youth and Sports, in co-operation with the European Union and Care Egypt Foundation for Development.
Minister Sobhi said foreigners who live in Egypt enjoy unprecedented attention and care by the country’s political leadership.
The ‘Safety, Empowerment and Protection for Refugees and Host Communities in Egypt’ project, he added, aspires to offer friendly spaces in youth centres.
He noted that the project is part of a package of programmes implement by his ministry to advance development across Egypt.
“The project will work to integrate foreigners living in Egypt into society,” the minister said.
He added that the project would also train these foreigners in a wide range of activities, including handicrafts,to empower them economically.
He revealed that the ‘Safety, Empowerment and Protection for Refugees and Host Communities in Egypt’ project would establish four friendly spaces in youth centres, namely in Hilmiyatel-Zeitoun in Cairo, el-Haramain and Burjel-Arab in Alexandria and in Maadi Youth Centre 77.
