Science academy president blasts west's scientific sanctions on Iran

President of Iran's Science Academy Reza Davari Ardakani in separate letters to his counterparts in different world states protested at the western countries' scientific sanctions against Iranian researchers and scholars. The letters were sent to the academies of sciences of France, Austria, Germany, Britain, Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Hungary, Croatia, the US, China, India, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Serbia and Sri Lanka. "At the dawn of the new academic year in Iran and all over the world, I would like to bring an issue to your kind attention so that, with your help and that of the other esteemed academicians, we may jointly address an solve this problem. As you may know, Iranian scientists, scholars and research fellows rank among the best in the world in their respective fields and hence have contributed a lot to the progress and advancement of science and technology, especially in the Muslim world," the letter said on Sunday. "Nevertheless, in recent years, under the banner of the imposed sanctions against the people and government of Iran, some publishers of scientific journals and periodicals have unfortunately started refusing the publication of the Iranian articles, which is in fact very disdainful. To give but one example, on the 30th April 2013, the Elsevier website in Holland instructed all its editors to refrain from publishing articles authored by Iranian scholars." "As you are aware, the freedom of scientific endeavor along with universal justice and human right require equal treatment of all scholarly activities of research fellows all over the world, including the appraisal and publication of the Iranian scholars' papers. Since free access to scientific papers is the right of every scholar all over the globe, it is up to the well-known academicians of distinguished countries to pursue this right of the Iranian scholars as well." "The existing friendly relations between our two academies encouraged me to seek your valuable cooperation in this regard," Davari Ardakani concluded.