OC Register Report on Syrian Honorary Consul

Hazem Chehabi (below right), UCI Chancellor Michael Drake (center), and retired vice chancellor
Manuel Gomez (left) receiving UCI Medal (Don't ask me for what.)

(Photo: OC Register)


The usually somnolent Orange County Register actually has a front page report on the on-going controversy brewing at UC Irvine over Hazem Chehabi, who is the local Syrian Honorary Consul as well as chair of the UCI Foundation. The UCI Student Government has passed a resolution calling on UCI to break its links with Chehabi.

http://www.ocregister.com/news/chehabi-344955-student-board.html

Generally, I tend not to sympathize with students telling administrators what they should or should not do. In fact, just this week, I described UCSD as a place where the "inmates run the institution". In this case, however, I have to side with the students. This is a clear moral issue. That the Syrian honorary consul would be occupying such a high position at UCI at the same time that the Syrian regime is committing mass murder against its own citizens strikes me as unconscionable.

I have written about this several times and already debated the position of honorary consul. How much does it really matter that Chehabi is unpaid and not an official Syrian diplomat? It seems that he has a clear cut decision to make. Either he wants to continue as honorary consul, or he wants to continue as chair of the UCI Foundation. As a matter of decency, he should either resign his post as honorary consul or resign from his post at UCI. To remain in both is an act of arrogance and can only bring continued embarrassment to the university.