A professor from Iran who was expelled from Norway because of security concerns tied to his work has defended his enormous research production, attacked Norway’s police intelligence unit PST and resigned his post at the University of Agder (UiA) on the country’s southern coast.
Newspaper Dagens Næringsliv (DN) reported this week that Professor Hamid Reza Karimi had formally resigned his part-time post as of March 1. His Norwegian defense attorney, Arild Humlen, said he’d considered continuing but felt the university was best-served if he quit.
DN has reported earlier how the professor attracted controversy both over his enormous amount of published research and because he’d been expelled by PST on suspicions that his work with high-speed cruise missiles would benefit the Chinese military. Even though he has appealed the expulsion, Humlen said he feared “intense control and surveillance” if he won in court and was allowed to remain in Norway. “It would be difficult for him to fully take part in research projects internationally,” added Humlen.
He added that Karimi was perplexed as to why some colleagues at UiA and other institutions questioned his volume of publishing. He claimed the level was “completely normal” on an international scale. He said his client also fears his the Norwegian authorities’ investigation of his work, and expulsion, will blacklist him as a researcher elsewhere. DN reported that PST declined comment.
newsinenglish.no staff
