Plight of medical students studying in Cuba

The parents of medical students studying in Cuba since July 2008 have appealed to the President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani to implement the recommendation of Senate Standing Committee on Education and send a delegation to Cuba to find facts about the reported plight of Pakistani students studying medicine.
Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, Naeem Kashif Qureshi said that the senate committee, which met with Senator Razina Alam Khan in the chair, also suggested that the students be provided with at least two return air tickets during their course and that their monthly stipend be increased from 50 euros to 100 euros. It, at the same time, asked the Higher Education Commission (HEC) to take Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) on board on the issue.
Some members said the courses taught to Pakistani students in Cuba should be recognised by World Health Organisation (WHO) so that they could practice medicine in Pakistan upon their return. He said that Pakistani students should be taught Spanish in Pakistan not in Cuba. Kashif further said that Senator Raza Muhammad Raza, who had recently visited the Medical City in Cuba where Pakistani students are studying medicine on scholarship, informed the committee that the courses being taught to Pakistanis in the Caribbean island were different from that of Pakistan. He said students were not sure whether they would get the WHO-recognised degrees.
He said the students were also confronting serious financial problems, unavailability of books, lack of lab and other facilities. HEC Chairman, Dr Atta-ur-Rehman informed the committee that he had held three meetings with the Cuban ambassador in Islamabad during which the diplomat assured him that Pakistani students would get ELAM degrees, which were in the process of being recognised by the WHO. He said that there was no truth in utterance of chairman that the HEC was in contact with the parents as well as Pakistan ambassador in Cuba, the PMDC and parents of the students. The Foreign Office representatives told the meeting that they and the Pakistani ambassador to Cuba were in touch with the students.
The committee urged the government to urgently provide funding for setting up nine new universities. It expressed serious concerns over the government's failure to release the HEC allocated funds. It may be recalled that about 1000 Pakistani students are studying in Cuba on scholarship offered by the Cuban government in February 2007. They are living in uncomfortable condition. They are studying in Campus AG-7, T-9. The First batch of 325 students reached Cuba in February 2007 while second batch of 614 students reached on July 13,2008.