Iran na 9/11

Damage control

Denounced by President Bush as belonging to the ‘Axis of Evil’, Iran has to combat against a reputation that its main export products are nuclear bombs and Islamic extremism. With UN sanctions at work against Iranian students and scholars, the scientific community of Iran is desperately trying to keep its academic standing on a high level. At the annual conference of the International Association of Universities (IAU) in July, President Abdollah Jasbi of the enormous Islamic Azad University in Tehran did all he could to get elected as IAU-president – but to no avail. His Mexican colleague Ramon de la Fuente won with a landslide victory.

Farhad Daneshjoo is university chancellor of the Tarbiat Modarres University in Iran. According to Rooz Online, he is the brother of Tehran province’s governor, Kamran Daneshjoo, who in turn is a very close associate of president Ahmadinejad. Holding a Ph.D. from Westminster, engineering professor Farhad Daneshjoo was appointed university chancellor shortly after Ahmadinejad came to power in 2005.

Daneshjoo underscores the vigor and independence of science in Iran. “The past 30 years, we have made enormous progress in the development cars, medicines and defence, so much so that there is really an industrial revolution going on. That is not the merit of Ahmadinejad, but the strength of our scientific community”.

Believing in exchange

Since the UN ruled that member states should prevent specialized training and education of Iranians on nuclear weapons, many universities refuse Iranian students and scholars altogether. What do you think of that?

Terrorists should be excluded because they are doing illegal acts. However, if Iranians want to study abroad, and they obey the rules, and are legally acting, what is the difference whether they are Americans or Iranians? This is educational apartheid. Free-minded people do not accept prohibitions in science. Universities should stand up and say they are against these kinds of prohibitions.

Such prohibitions actually come from people who want to rule the world. They want to build an empire. Iran has not made progress because of students studying abroad. Scientific progress is local, not dependent on study abroad. If we send students, it is because we believe in exchange – disseminating knowledge in a two-way street.

Can you understand that the USA feels threatened after 9/11 that Iran might have nuclear power?

Whatever it was, it was bad and sad incident. All universities are against killing people. However, if people are killed by terrorists in USA, it does not give the US government a license to kill people in Iraq. The US government reacted very sensationally and did not sufficiently take into account the reactions in the world.

In Iran, we do not have nuclear bombs. Our nuclear program is completely peaceful, we do not have the capacity to make nuclear bombs. On that point, our scientific community is overestimated. Rumors on that are not based on proof. I know that to prove the contrary is just as difficult. But we have the Internationaly Atomic Energy Agency on our side, asserting that you should only sanction if you are sure that atomic bombs are made.

We do not want a bomb. It is not in the interest of humanity. We are scared by nuclear power as well. We do not believe that having nuclear bombs ends security threats. The people as well as the government just want peace.

Know cultures as well

What, then, should the USA do?

Thus far, the Americans have not adequately fought the terrorists. Force is one thing, timing another. You should know cultures as well and not overrule democracies. They believe that what they say has to be accepted by other countries. Such policies are endangering the world.

Look at what is happening in Afghanistan and Iraq. One of the reasons that the populations of those countries resist the American interpretation of democracy is exactly because it is forced on them. Democracy in its nature cannot be forced upon a people. That will not bring peace to the world. Sheer force does not kill the words of terrorists. They think as well. We should be more clever than them.

I hope the next US government will be different, more thoughtful. I have seen various signs that even in the current government, viewpoints are changing. Let us hope that the next government chooses a better approach. I believe everything can be solved.

Is there academic freedom in Iran?

Certainly. Iran is a democracy. Most professors in Iran are open-minded and believe in human rights. We all support the government in our country because it provides housing, jobs and security. We do not mind too much that president Bush does not like president Ahmadinejad. We just look whether he gives us a better economy and life. If he fails to do so, we will just choose somebody else.

I myself am a professor in structural engineering, working for example on earthquake engineering. Most professors are working on such topics that bring our country forward. We do not prohibit student or professor exchange. We are building an international campus. Currently, we have students from Spain, Afghanistan and 2 from Italy.  We hope that in 3-4 years time, we will have 1000 students on our international campus, studying science, engineering or humanities, whatever they want.