Chinese specialists have implanted a pacemaker in a patient in São Tomé and Príncipe, becoming the first to perform such surgery there, STP-Press reports, quoting São Toméan Health Minister Edgar Neves.

The surgeons performed the operation in the Ayres Menezes Hospital in the capital, São Tomé, on Monday, the São Toméan state-run news agency says in a report it carried the day after.

Mr Neves said the accomplishment of such surgery in his country would save the trouble and expense of sending patients abroad for the operation.

The operation was a milestone in the history of Sino-São Toméan cooperation, STP-Press quotes Chinese Ambassador to São Tomé and Príncipe Xu Yingzhen as saying.

In April the Portuguese news agency, Lusa, reported that a party of Chinese health workers, including cardiologists, had begun a medical mission to São Tomé and Príncipe which would last three years.