In a joint statement issued in Seoul yesterday following a summit held at president's office at Cheong Wa Dae, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Korean President Lee Myung-bak agreed to boost economic ties and cultural exchanges between the two countries.

Bringing together Qatar’s myriad film initiatives under one banner, H E Sheikha Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani officially launched the Doha Film Institute (DFI) yesterday. The institute, launched at the Cannes International Film Festival, expands the scope of Qatar’s international film ambitions and ventures.

For 55 years, South Chung-cheong’s Baekje Culture Festival has been a modest regional celebration of one of Korea’s ancient three kingdoms. But this year, the local government is taking it international, running activities to attract foreign visitors to the event from Sept. 18 to Oct. 17 in the district of Buyeo and city of Gongju. With it comes a new name, the 2010 Great Baekje World Festival.

Bangladesh and South Korea have signed two agreements and two memoranda of understanding (MoUs) for strengthening economic and cultural cooperation between the two Asian nations...The agreements are on an economic development fund loan and a cultural exchange programme while the MoUs were on energy cooperation and environmental protection.

DOT paintings from the indigenous Papunya community are heading to the heart of Beijing. In an exercise in cultural diplomacy, packers at the National Museum of Australia spent yesterday sliding paintings from its successful 2007-08 exhibition into crates marked for the National Art Museum of China.

Hazami Barmada is the president and CEO of Al-Mubadarah Arab Empowerment Initiative. As a public and cultural diplomacy professional, she focuses on international collaboration and community development with Arab-Muslim global communities.

The players on Iraq's premier national baseball team saw a baseball stadium for the first time on a recent 10-day visit to the United States, courtesy of the State Department.

All you need to know about the study of foreign languages in the United States is that many more middle and high school students are studying the dead language spoken by Caesar and Nero than such critically important tongues as Chinese, Arabic, Hindu, Farsi, Japanese, Russian and Urdu combined.