Northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region will extend cooperation with Russia to protect and restore documents of the Western Xia Dynasty (1038-1227 AD).

Located in northwest China, Western Xia co-existed with the Song Dynasty (960-1279 AD) for around 200 years, yet it left behind few documents and cultural relics due to frequent wars in the area, said archaeologists.

In the early 20th century, explorers from Russia and Britain discovered at Heishui City, north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, a large amount of documents of the Western Xia Dynasty, which became the authoritative materials for studies of the dynasty.

Among the documents taken back to Russia, there were over 8,000 files of Buddhist lections as well as non-religious records, archaeologists said.

However, Russia could not afford to protect and restore the documents since the 1990s, and Ningxia planned to send experts on the Western Xia Dynasty to Russia while spending two million yuan (about US$241,838) to clear up and research the documents.

The two countries have reached an agreement that the documents will still be kept in Russia when all work is finished, but China can acquire a complete copy of them for studying purposes.

(Xinhua News Agency March 27, 2004)