29 June 2007

Dear Colleagues and Friends,

When IHEOC organised the previous International Symposia on HE in Iraq in 2004 and 2005, we simple invited you to attend at an easy-to-reach place at the centre of London. However for the forthcoming conference the invitation asked you to submit a paper and to travel to Erbil in Kurdistan, Iraq.

In spite of this being more difficult we have had an excellent response from you and from all over the world, far exceeding our expectations, given the time available. Furthermore the abstracts/papers are of an outstanding standard and in line with the theme of the conference. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you very much indeed for your contributions to the advancement of HE in Iraq.

Your support and contributions pointed toward a successful and larger than expected symposium to come, for which reason the Ministry of Higher Education in Kurdistan, Iraq and the Iraqi Universities have requested more time to prepare for such an important event so as to benefit more from its happening in Iraq. They have very recently asked us, if it would be possible to delay the conference to around mid-December 2007, to give them more time to prepare and to involve more of their staff more effectively in the sessions.

Considering the difficult circumstances they are in and their limited access to the internet and other data resources, the request seemed eminently reasonable to us, and we believe you will share this view. We have therefore agreed to the postponement.

The conference will be moved from 4-6 Sept 07 to a round 11-14 Dec 2007. The revised dates will be confirmed to you once they have been agreed by the Ministries of HE and Scientific Research in Iraq and in Kurdistan, Iraq.

All abstracts/papers submitted to date will be taken forward to the conference in December, and a new deadline will be set to give an opportunity to those, particularly from Iraq, who may wish to submit a paper.

I am very sorry if this delay causes any problem to anybody and I sincerely hope that all those who planned to come in September will be able to do so in December 2007.

There are some incidental advantages from this delay, one of which is that there will be no clash with the British HE Sept conference in Glasgow, and we hope that more people from the UK will be able to attend as a result.

Finally, I have been informed that Kurdistan is even more beautiful in December so I'm sure we will have an enjoyable, useful and constructive conference there.

Once again thank you for your support and constructive contributions to our joint efforts to help in the rebuilding of HE in Iraq.

Yours sincerely,
 

Dr Abbas Al-Hussaini
Secretary General of the Iraq Higher Education Organising Committee
London, UK