ICSIA

1. We have visited Iraqi universities in Baghdad.

2. We have caught the attention of the international opinion: La Libre Belgique, Liberazione, Science, Le Temps and Le Monde published the international appeal that was signed by 150 Iraqi academic personalities.

3. A campaign for solidarity was launched on Arab and French radios and television.

4. We met with the Director-General of Unesco twice; he wrote a communiqué condemning the situation of Iraqi academics

5. We went to New York and met with the person in charge of the Iraqi Desk, that of Unicef, and that of Unesco in the United Nations headquarters.

6. We went to Cairo and met with the union of Egyptian journalists.

7. We met with the academic personnel at Columbia University to talk about Iraqis.

8. We met with the Ambassador to the Iraqi Republic in Washington.

9. We had a meeting at the Qatar Foundation in Doha and met with the spokespeople of Iraqi academics to make a plan of action.

10. We plan on buying a house to accommodate Iraqi professors who have lost their own. Read the rest of ‘Undertaken steps and projects’ »

More than 200 academics were assassinated in Iraq

Since 2003, Iraq has seen its victims increase endlessly. Each year, more than 100 scientists and academics pay of their life their involvement in favor of the knowledge and the culture. In front of the deterioration of the security situation which caused kidnappings, assassination of several hundreds of Iraqi academics and the forced exile of hundreds of Iraqi intellectuals, leaving the country deprived of its main resources, we call the Iraqi authorities, the multinational forces and all the actors involved to take all necessary measures to ensure the protection and the defense of Iraqi scientists and academics. We recall to the international community its international commitments to the respect of fundamental freedoms.

International Committee for the Protection of the Iraqi Academics
Hasni Abidi. Director of Geneva Center for Study and Research on the Arab and Mediterranean World (CERMAM)
Kais Al Azzawi. Director of the Iraqi Observatory, Bagdad
Prof Victoria Curzon Price, University of Geneva

Please return signatures to sali_djebbari@yahoo.fr Read the rest of ‘International call for the protection and the defense of the Iraqi academics’ »

By Felicity Arbuthnot, Feb. 28, 2006

US soldiers frisk Iraqi students and employees of Baghdad University following the shooting of an American soldier.

Iraq, the land of ancient Mesopotamia, also known as the “cradle of civilization” to archeologists, gifted the world many of academia’s “pillars of wisdom.” Many who even came before Europe had built its first cathedral, or the Romans the Coliseum.

The first written records, domestic laws, astronomy, mathematics, pharmacology, and the wheel are believed to have been developed at Ur, the earliest civil society in the world. It is also believed to be the site of the Garden of Eden.

In between numerous invasions in the turbulent region, knowledge has been lost or destroyed, only to reemerge triumphant with an advanced enhanced civilization. Learning has long been central in Iraq. The first question by a prospective bride’s parents, if they are educated, that is always asked is, “What did he study? What level is his degree?” said Sana al Khayyat, the author of Honour and Shame: Women in Modern Iraq.

A modern repeat of history’s losses was the 13-year-long US- and UK-driven UN embargo (1990-2003), which forced many academics to leave, seeking positions in countries that had harder currency so they could send back money to sustain both their extended and immediate families. Inflation had become, almost overnight, stratospheric and staples for many were virtually unaffordable. Read the rest of ‘Iraq: Academia’s Killing Fields’ »

ScienceDaily (Sep. 7, 2007) — Several genes with strong associations to schizophrenia have evolved rapidly due to selection during human evolution, according to new research.

Researchers found a higher prevalence of the influence of so-called positive selection on genes or gene regions known to be associated with the disorder than a comparable control set of non-associated genes, functioning in similar neuronal processes.

This is consistent with the theory that positive selection may play a role in the persistence of schizophrenia at a frequency of one per cent in human populations around the world, despite its strong effects on reproductive fitness and its high heritability from generation-to-generation.

It also provides genetic evidence consistent with the long-standing theory that schizophrenia represents, in part, a maladaptive by-product of adaptive changes during human evolution - possibly to do with aspects of creativity and human cognition.

“The world-wide presence of this disorder at an appreciable frequency, despite its impact on human health and reproductive fitness, is somewhat of a paradox,” said Dr Steve Dorus from the University of Bath, who worked with Dr Bernard Crespi from Simon Fraser University (Canada) and Dr Kyle Summers from East Carolina University (USA) on the research. Read the rest of ‘Genes Associated With Schizophrenia’ »

The New York Times

BAGHDAD (AP) — A suicide car bomber penetrated tight security to strike an Iraqi military base on Sunday in the deadliest of a series of attacks that killed at least 42 people across Iraq. In Baghdad, the U.S.-protected Green Zone came under heavy fire by rockets or mortar rounds.

Seven people also were killed and 14 wounded in a suicide car bombing in the Shiite area of Shula in the capital.

The attacks underscored the fragility of Iraq’s security, despite a decline in violence over the past year. They also came as the U.S. military death toll in Iraq nears 4,000.

Weekend raids across Iraq resulted in 17 insurgents killed and 30 detained, the U.S. military said. The deadliest was an operation Sunday targeting a suspected suicide bombing network east of Baqouba that killed 12 armed men, the military said.

Iraqi police reported a dozen civilians killed in an airstrike in the same area. But the military said those killed in the raid were insurgents, including six who had shaved their bodies apparently in preparation for suicide operations. Read the rest of ‘At Least 42 Are Killed in Attacks in Iraq’ »