Committee of Concerned Scientists

An international non-profit organization of scientists, physicians, engineers and scholars dedicated to protecting the human rights and scientific freedom of our colleagues around the world.

An independent non-profit organization of scientists, physicians, engineers and scholars dedicated to protecting the human rights and scientific freedom of our colleagues around the world.

Iranian Graduate Student in Belgium Sentenced for Scholarship Funding

In a repeat of the arrest, prosecution, and sentencing of Omid Kokabee, Hamid Babaei, an industrial engineering student in Belgium, was arrested as he attempted to return to his studies at the University of Liege. He was sentenced to six years in prison for communicating with a hostile government, apparently on the basis of his scholarship funding.

CCS wrote to protest this charge, that Babaei denies, and to urge dismissal of the charges.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran
c/o H.E. Mohammad Khazaee
Ambassador of Iran to the United Nations
Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations
622 Third Avenue
New York NY 10017

April 14, 2014

Your Excellency:

We write to you now in support of Mr. Hamid Babaei, an industrial engineering student from Iran University of Science and Technology who is in the process of completing a doctoral degree in Finance at the University of Liege in Belgium. On December 21, 2013, Mr. Babaei was sentenced to six years in prison for allegedly acting against national security.

We are writing to you because we understand that the alleged basis of this charge is the scholarship funding which Mr. Babaei received to complete his graduate studies from the University of Liege in Belgium. Reports indicate that Mr. Babaei was arrested in August 2013 after attempting to return to Belgium from a summer visit in Iran. He spent four months in detention, including three weeks of solitary confinement, and was sentenced to six years in prison for being a threat to national security, for communicating with a hostile government. Mr. Babaei was unsuccessfully pressured to make a false confession, and has repeatedly denied the charges against him.

Mr. Babaei’s sudden arrest without clear public explanation, his prolonged detention, and his conviction without substantial evidence, suggest a troubling disregard of international standards of due process, fair trial and detention, as guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Iran is signatory.

Therefore, we urge you to investigate the circumstances of this case and thoroughly address the conduct of the prosecutors and local authorities involved in convicting Babaei of acting against Iran’s national security by accepting a fellowship from a Belgian university. Absent any other basis for his conviction, we urge you to release him and allow his to return to his studies, as a clear and firm demonstration of Iran’s commitment to academic freedom, as well as justice.

Sincerely,

Joel L. Lebowitz
Paul H. Plotz
Walter Reich
Eugene M. Chudnovsky
Alexander Greer

Co-Chairs, Committee of Concerned Scientists

Copies to:

Head of the Judiciary Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani.
Howzeh Riyasat-e Qoveh Qazay
Pasteur St. Vali Asr. Ave. (south of Serah-e Jomhuri
Tehran 1316814737, Islamic Republic of Iran

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Who We Are

Co-chairs

Joel L. Lebowitz, Rutgers University

Paul H. Plotz, M.D., Washington, DC

Walter Reich, George Washington University

Eugene Chudnovsky, Lehman College

Alexander Greer, Brooklyn College

Vice-chairs

Astronomy – Arno Penzias, New Enterprises Associates*

Biology – Max E. Gottesman, Columbia University

Chemistry – Zafra Lerman, MIMSAD Inc.

Computer Science – Rachelle Heller, The George Washington University

Computer Science – Jack Minker, University of Maryland, College Park

Engineering – Philip Sarachik, NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering

Mathematics – Simon Levin, Princeton University

Medical Sciences – J. Joseph Blum, Duke University

Honorary Board Members

Nancy Andrews, Duke University

David Baltimore, California Institute of Technology*

Alan J. Bard, University of Texas

Jacob Bigeleisen (deceased), SUNY, Stony Brook

Raoul Bott (deceased), Harvard University

Owen Chamberlain (deceased), University of California, Berkeley

Stanley Deser, Brandeis University

Edward Gerjuoy, University of Pittsburg

David Gross, (2004 Nobel Prize in Physics), Kavil Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara*

Pierre Hohenberg (deceased), New York University

Walter Kohn (deceased), University of California, Santa Barbara*

James Langer, University of California, Santa Barbara

Peter Lax, New York University

Louis Nirenberg, New York University

Marshall Nirenberg (deceased), National Institutes of Health*

Honorary Board Members

John C. Polanyi, University of Toronto*

Stuart Rice, University of Chicago

Sir Richard J. Roberts, (1993 Nobel Prize in Physiology & Medicine), New England Biolabs*

Myriam Sarachick, City College of New York

Harold Scheraga, Cornell University

Sylvan Schweber (deceased), Brandeis University

Maxine Singer, Carnegie Institution of Washington

Alfred I. Tauber, Boston University

Steven Weinberg, University of Texas, Austin*

Myrna Weissman, Columbia University

Rosalyn S. Yalow (deceased), Mount Sinai School of Medicine*

* Nobel laureate

Committee of Concerned Scientists

c/o Alexandra R. Bender, Executive Director
P.O. Box 273
Mountainhome, PA 18342
Phone: (570) 994-2093
abender@concernedscientists.org