Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 18, 2002)
Nation & world briefing Iran orders professor’s death sentence lifted Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT) TEHRAN — Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, ordered the death sentence of a popular reformist history professor reversed on Sunday, amid escalat ing demonstrations against the ver dict at universities around the Is lamic Republic capital. As supreme leader, Khamenei has the final say on all matters of state and religion, but as of Sun day night, the judiciary had not publicly responded to his order. The nation’s chief jurist, Mahmud Hashemi-Sharudi, has requested a meeting with Khamenei to discuss the verdict against professor Hashem Aghajari, who was found guilty of apostasy, or abandoning Iran’s Shiite Muslim faith. Khamenei’s order came in re sponse to an appeal by a group erf uni versity professors, said Mehdi Karru bi, the speaker of the Majlis, the Iranian parliament. The Supreme Leader has repeatedly called on Iran’s judiciary to use caution in handing down death sentences “to avoid giv ing any pretext to either enemies or friendly critics for challenges” to the regime, state-run Iranian television reported on Sunday. Besides ordering Aghajari’s exe cution on Nov. 6, a hard-line judge handed the disabled Iran-Iraq war veteran an eight-year prison sen tence and 74 lashes with a leather whip, and banned him from teach ing for 10 years, all of which would remain in effect if the death sen tence were rescinded. Aghajari was prosecuted for a speech he gave in the western Iran ian city of Hamadan in August, in which he said Shiite Muslims were not “monkeys” to blindly follow the teachings of senior clerics. Karrubi on Sunday urged Aghajari to appeal his sentence “immediate ly” to end the issue, which the pro fessor until now has refused to do. The death sentence has sparked a revival of a student-led movement for political and social reforms in the Islamic Republic. That move ment has been dormant since 1999, when hardline militias crushed the previous wave of student uprisings, killing several protesters. Students have become wiser since those days, learning to protest within the framework of Iranian law and not riot in the streets, said Saeed Razavifaghee, a Tabriz University philosophy pro fessor and former editorial board member of the banned reformist newspaper, No-Ruz, or New Day. He predicted that the pro-reform demonstrations on campuses that started 10 days ago would continue even if Aghajari’s death sentence were rescinded. © 2002, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services. Rising Israeli politician says negotiate or exit West Bank Carol Rosenberg Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT) HAIFA, Israel — Amran Mitzna, the mayor of Haifa and a contender to lead Israel’s Labor Party, may be the most tone-deaf politician to en ter Israeli politics in years. He re cently told visiting American Jewish donors something they would rather not hear: If negotiations with the Palestinians fail, Israel should abandon the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Building Jewish settlements on what had been Arab land, pio neered by his own party after Is rael’s victorious 1967 Six-Day War with the Arabs, “was a mistake and we have to confess it was a mis take. It is a dream that we cannot have today,” he said, while some in the audience groaned. But if opinion polls are correct, the 57-year-old retired major gen eral with the demeanor of a dis tracted college professor is likely to be the main opposition party’s champion against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s ruling right-wing Likud Bloc. Victory in the Jan. 28 national poll is a long shot, to be sure. Polls show that a Likud led by Sharon or Foreign Minister Benjamin Ne tanyahu is likely to win more seats in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset. But, for now, this soldier-turned mayor who has never served in the Knesset is poised to win the left-of center party leadership from an other ex-general and veteran politi cian, former Defense Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer, who until recently served with Sharon as a junior partner in Israel’s National Unity Government. Mitzna has been steadily climbing in popularity in the run-up to Tues day’s Labor Party primary, articulat ing a vision that has been around for decades but sounds subversive to some after two years of bloody Palestinian-Israeli warfare. Faced with the longest wave of terrorist attacks in Israeli history, he says, “We must fight terrorism like there are no negotiations. And we must negotiate like there UC system to check claims of applicants Becky Bartindale Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT) SAN JOSE, Calif. — Starting next year, the University of California sys tem will begin spot-checking students’ claims about their accomplishments and personal circumstances, an at tempt to discourage them from embel lishing or lying on their applications as competition for admission increases. It’s an effort to face concerns that some students may exaggerate their achievements or fabricate hardship stories because getting good grades and test scores is no longer enough to guarantee admission to the most popular University of California cam puses. The verification program is believed to be the first such formal ef fort in the nation. Students applying for admission in fall 2003 will be the first class to have their veracity routinely tested. Cur rently, individual campuses check high school grades after the senior year and any obviously suspicious statements. But beginning in Janu ary, an undetermined number of the system’s freshman applicants will be asked to provide support for elaims about such things as activities out side the classroom, personal achieve ments and obstacles overcome. David Barden, 18, a senior at Cali fornia’s Los Gatos High School who is in the thick of the college-application process, said he welcomes fact-check ing. The pressure to get into a “good” school is intense, he said, and stu dents might fudge the truth because they think they haven’t done enough or think everyone else is doing it. “It would just make people think twice about lying on their applica tions,” he said. “It makes a more even playing field.” Although concern about student re sume inflation is an issue nationally, the University of California may be the first system to take formal steps to root out the problem, said Judy Hin gle, director of professional develop ment for the National Association of College Admissions Counselors. © 2002, San Jose Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.). Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services. is no terrorism.” If that means talking to Yasser Arafat while rescue workers are scraping up the remains of suicide bombings, Mitzna says he’ll do it. If it means concluding that there is no hope for negotiations and that the only way to achieve “separa tion” is by removing Jewish set tlers from the West Bank and Gaza, he says he’ll do that, too. © 2002, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services. 014334 Locally owned LUBE, OIL, FILTER, TIRE ROTATION • Chassis Lube • New Oil Filter • Up to 5 Qts. 10W-30 Chevron Oil • Clean Front Window • Vacuum Front Floor Boards • No Appointment necessary • Most cars & light trucks • 3/4 or 1-ton & Extra Cab Trucks Additional Chevron MOTOR OIL POUR IN THE PROTECTION DOWNTOWN 1320 Willamette • 485-2356 Meet with representatives from over 60 countries and students who have studied there! Study Abroad Fair" WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20TH EMU FIR ROOM OFFICE OF INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMS 330 Oregon Hall 346-3207 http://studyabroad.uoregon.edu emu master plan rette You are cordially invited to participate in designing the future EMU. '. his free-flowing forum with the EMU Master Plan architects is open to the entire campus community. Wednesday nov. 20th 3-5pm ben linder room emu lower level Please drop by at your convenience. UNIVERSITY OK OREGON