2:05 P.M. EDT
MR. FARRELL: Well, thank you very much. My name is Tom Farrell. I'm Deputy Assistance Secretary for Academic Programs, the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, and it's really a distinct honor and a pleasure for me to introduce a group of important visitors to the United States.
As many of you know, in late April, the U.S. Department of State participated, led a delegation to Libya of U.S. Government officials concerned with the education relationship, the training relationship between the United States and Libya. This was soon after our government announced a rapprochement in our relationships with Libya. There was -- the U.S. delegation represented the higher education sector, basic education sector. It included representatives from the U.S. Agency for International Development, and it was led by -- co-led by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the Near Eastern Bureau at the State Department's Middle East Partnership Initiative.
That delegation was extremely well received by officials in Libya. We were given access both to the higher education and the basic education sector to university and education officials. We visited institutions of higher learning, high schools, teacher training institutes, both in the capital Tripoli, and also in El-Beida in eastern Tripoli and eastern Libya.
And we returned with a very definite sense that the time was right for renewal of relationships and that education in Libya was high quality, and that there were many areas where we could seek mutual cooperation in the field of education and national development both for Libyans -- and I also want to impress upon our friends that we're also looking for American -- opportunities for American students, scholars and institutions to interact with Libya. So this is truly a binational, bilateral program of mutual benefit.
We are now fortunate to have with us the reciprocal delegation from Libya, which arrived here the day after the United States and Libya in Tripoli announced an upgrading of our relationship. We're moving from an Interests Section status in Tripoli and Washington to a Liaison Office. This is a significant development in terms of our bilateral relationships. It will move, eventually, to a full diplomatic relationship.
And so we're very pleased to have with us representatives in this delegation, the nine-person delegation, from universities in Libya: Omar Al-Mukhtar University in El-Beida in eastern Libya, Sabha University in the southern part, and Al-Fateh University in Tripoli, Al-Fateh being the largest university. El-Beida and -- Sabha and El-Beida -- Omar Al-Mukhtar University are represented by their presidents, and Al-Fateh University by the vice president.
And then we also have officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the higher education government sector, the National Center -- Planning Center for Education and Vocational Training.
So we -- the four gentlemen, who are about to introduce themselves, represent the university sector, the central government sector, both the Foreign Ministry and the National Planning Center for Education. And very important in our relationships on the education side and the human resource side, humanitarian side, is the issue of medical education and medical cooperation in the field of health, and the delegation is led by Dr. Langhi, who is with the Tripoli Medical Center.
So we have, as I said, the Foreign Ministry, central government education representatives, university representatives and the very important medical sector representatives. And I think without further ado, it would be good for these gentlemen to introduce themselves and then we can get into questions about the visit. So we'll begin with the leader of the delegation.
Dr. Langhi.
DR. LANGHI: Shall I speak in Arabic or English?
MR. FARRELL: English or Arabic, what do you want?
QUESTION: English.
QUESTION: English.
DR. LANGHI: Would you all understand me if I speak in Arabic?
QUESTION: No. Maybe you could do a summary after you --
DR. LANGHI: So I'll speak in English.
QUESTION: English better because --
MR. FARRELL: Okay.
QUESTION: Thank you.
MR. LANGHI: My name is Murad Ali Langhi, Langhi, Lanun Kafiet (ph). Spelling (inaudible). I'm a Professor of Orthopedics in Tripoli Medical Center. I am heading this delegation. I'm a practicing orthopedic surgeon. And we are here to reciprocate with our colleagues from the United States who visited us last April to initiate bilateral educational and consular relationship between the two countries and to develop mutual cooperation in the field of education, health sciences and development programs in the field of research.
QUESTION: Thank you, Dr. Murad. My name is Abdalla Zaied, and I am the president of Omar Mukhtar University, which is, as Tom just mentioned, located in the Eastern part of Libya, about 200 kilometers west of -- east of Bengali, and I am delighted to be a member of this delegation to the United States, aiming to achieve a comprehensive program for a mutual cooperation in the future between our universities and institutes in the field of higher education and science and technology with the American institutes and universities in the United States.
QUESTION: My name is Abdunnabi Abughania. I am the Director of the National Planning Center for Education and Vocational Training and our center is responsible for education on all levels in Libya. And since we don't have a Ministry of Education in Libya, so our center affiliated with the General People's Committee who (inaudible) for executive matters of education in Libya.
Thank you.
QUESTION: My name is Ibrahim Al-Dridi. I am Deputy Director of the Department of the Americas in the General People's Committee for International Relation and Cooperation, which is Minister of Foreign Affairs. And I am a member of this delegation to facilitate, coordinate and to supervise what the two sides -- which field of education.
Thank you.
MR. FARRELL: I can make another statement.
(Laughter.)
QUESTION: My name is Samir Nader. I'm with Radio Sawa. The United States invited Libya last February to open an Interests Section in Washington, but the Libyan Government didn't take action on this. So what's the reason behind this?
A PARTICIPANT: Well, actually, actions has been already taken to open an Interests Section. The diplomats, they have -- they were here in Washington. They have already looked for; it weren't a place. So probably I will share with the chargé d'affaires in Canada. He is (inaudible) here in Washington, Mr. Ali Aujali, so he will lead or be the chargé d'affaires here in Washington.
So, I mean, things has been already taken and probably within few weeks or less there will be here, the section will be open in Washington.
QUESTION: What's the name of the gentlemen? Ali --
DR. LANGHI: Mr. Ali Aujali.
QUESTION: Aujali?
DR. LANGHI: Uh-huh.
QUESTION: Today, because of lack of (inaudible) --
QUESTION: (Inaudible.)
A PARTICIPANT: Can you introduce yourself, ma'am? Who you're with, please?
QUESTION: Joyce Karam, Al Hayat newspaper. And my question is: what is Libya's status academically on -- how is the curriculum? I want to deal with issues of incitement to the U.S. (inaudible) or control. And if this issue has been discussed, will there be any (inaudible)?
MR. FARRELL: First of all, I want to take the opportunity to talk about the quality of Libyan education that we saw during our visit and then I would ask you to clarify some -- or to break your question into two parts. Let me begin to answer the part I think is very important to me.
We -- the U.S. delegation, which had representatives from the U.S. higher education, private sector, as well as representatives of the government sector, were extremely impressed by the quality of training, the level of instruction that we -- and the seriousness of purpose that we saw at the institutions in Tripoli and Beida that we visited. We also -- you know, it has been 20 -- more than 20 years since we've had a close educational relationship with Libya, so some of us had forgotten how close the relationship had been.
I think one of the most interesting things for us to learn or to rediscover was that so many of the leaders in education in Libya, especially in the higher education sector, were -- had benefited from exchange programs, had studied in the United States. So there -- over the years in the '60s, the '70s and the early '80s -- so we felt that the -- in terms of academic training, there would be very little way -- very little -- very few obstacles in the way of reestablishing a relationship.
The main thing we all -- both sides agree we have to work on is English capacity because there has been an emphasis in university teaching in Libya for the last few years more on instruction in Arabic rather than in English, so we do have to work on English.
Now, what was the second part of the question?
QUESTION: My other question, the second part of the question, regarding the content of the curriculum if you went over schools -- high, elementary, high school and universities, and if there is any kind of incitement as to the program to the (inaudible) --
MR. FARRELL: Uh-huh, I see what you mean.
QUESTION: (Inaudible.) And if we're going to see (inaudible) --
MR. FARRELL: Okay.
QUESTION: -- program like the ones we had in Saudi Arabia to (inaudible).
MR. FARRELL: Okay. Well, you know, we -- as I said, we were provided with opportunities to meet with students, with teachers, in primary and secondary schools, and of course, at the university and research institutes. I saw no evidence of a need for a change in the ideology of the curriculum. Chemistry was taught like chemistry, there -- history -- I mean, I saw textbooks -- now, I don't speak Arabic, but I saw textbooks in the primary school that seemed fairly straightforward. In fact, some of them were produced by British companies and other publishers.
So it's not as if we look -- we're looking at, you know, a cleansing of the curriculum. It doesn't seem to be that case at all. Is that what you mean?
A PARTICIPANT: Can I clarify?
MR. FARRELL: Sure, sure. Of course.
A PARTICIPANT: I think I'll go straight to the answer. In Libya, we are not a closed society, closed to the Arab world or to other. So for our curricula, we are sharing the ideas with UNESCO people, with the Arab experts, you know, in different fields, you know. So taking the practical side, you know, chemistry, science and other fields, you know, we have people from UNESCO and other experts from different nationalities.
For the social area, you're talking about history, geography, about Arab languages, Islamic culture. I think most of the Libyan curricula are based on -- shared from the Arab region. And I think you know Libya, you know, we have different teachers from different Arab worlds, you know, countries, you know.
So I think it's not restricted, you know, and it's reviewed many, many times, you know, by us and by our brothers, you know.
QUESTION: I have a question for Dr. Ibrahim Al-Dridi. My name is Mohamed Menshawy. I'm with Asharq Al Awsat newspaper. Do you come close enough to (inaudible) the American official?
DR. AL-DRIDI: No. The answer is no. Only for the educational --
QUESTION: (Inaudible).
DR. AL-DRIDI: Political issues has been taken care of (inaudible) between two sides. So, this is -- the delegation (inaudible) mission or objective, only to discuss educational matters.
QUESTION: You didn’t meet any officials, American officials there higher than you?
(Laughter.)
MR. FARRELL: Oh, no, higher than me, yeah -- no, yes. They have met with officials in the --
QUESTION: (Inaudible.)
MR. FARRELL: No, no, no, I'm not taking an offense at all, but I know what you mean. You know, if I may, you know, education and understanding between various people is a very political issue. It goes at the -- goes to the heart of the bilateral relationship.
So I, working in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, I would say that everything we talk about is politics in this area; secondly, that the delegation has had opportunities to meet with senior officials in the department and the Bureau of Near Eastern and North African Affairs, the senior officials in the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Right, so.
DR. AL-DRIDI: You will if you can --
MR. FARRELL: Higher-ranking than me.
A PARTICIPANT: Well, that's politics. I mean, if you meet --
DR. AL-DRIDI: Well, if you can figure this -- you know, you always (inaudible) politics from (inaudible) politics. What I was thinking that you mean by politics is to talk about -- you know, other issues politically, specifically. But if you can take this as a part of (inaudible). But if not for politics, we maybe we are not here now.
QUESTION: And when would you expect that Libyan (inaudible).
A PARTICIPANT: Very soon.
(Laughter.)
QUESTION: I mean (inaudible) now or?
A PARTICIPANT: No, no, as I answered this question in the beginning, that I said it's a matter of a technicality. It's a matter up to time to just (inaudible) -- send people to rent a place because the old Embassy is not really --
A PARTICIPANT: Suitable.
A PARTICIPANT: -- suitable to function very soon. So, we are going to a new building, so to be very soon of the --
PARTICIPANT: In a matter of months, we should have an establishment here in Washington.
PARTICIPANT: A matter of months?
PARTICIPANT: Yes.
PARTICIPANT: Maybe it is better, depending on (inaudible).
PARTICIPANT: As soon as we locate a place and hire it and maintain it. And our staff already -- they're already in Canada waiting to move into a suitable place here. Next question?
QUESTION: Yes, I just want to follow -- my name is Khaled Dawoud from Egypt's Al Ahram newspaper and I want to follow up on Joyce's question. Again, I mean, I've been to Libya several times and I know that the rhetoric there has been based on anti-imperialism, anti-Americanism for so long, I mean, in universities and public places.
So, I mean, how are you going to change this? How are you going to justify to your students the sudden shift from being so anti-American to being friendly with the Americans?
A PARTICIPANT: Really, you are talking about -- talking about textbooks. Is that right, or what?
QUESTION: I'm talking about the general rhetoric, I mean, for university students, the kind of upbringing for generations, you know, that -- for generations, the Libyans have been brought up that Americans are the enemy.
A PARTICIPANT: Well, I think now -- when we are talking people-to-people, you know, it's -- I think we have -- with respect for American people and for politics, I think our relation now will paved the way to go to a normal relations, and I think that's why we are here, you know.
But for -- if we are talking about the syllabus or about the curricula itself, you know, we won't have anything about anti-America things here.
A PARTICIPANT: In Libya, the people of Libya have never been enemies of the people of the United States. Differences which were in the past between the governments were circumstances now are resolving, and we are returning back to normal relationship.
We had in the past thousands of students studying in this country. We still, we are looking forward to having thousands more, with the help of our colleagues here. And I think the people of Libya hold great regard for the people of United States.
QUESTION: Again, just to -- I mean, the gentleman here, he mentioned the fact that teaching English was banned in Libya, at one stage.
A PARTICIPANT: At one stage, yes, it was --
QUESTION: Completely banned, so I mean, how are you going to justify now the shift to the people, tell them English was bad, now English is good?
A PARTICIPANT: No, this -- English is now being taught, even in primary schools. It has been for years now, being taught in primary schools, second schools and university. And it's a first language -- I mean, second language, sorry, after Arabic, of course. And we like to teach it to (inaudible), even to kindergarteners, if we can, because we think it is an important language.
QUESTION: I think it's -- yeah, they're talking about English, it's now everywhere, you know, it's the language, you know, internationally speaking. So if we are talking about people in Washington, information technology or computer or Internet, you know, we have to (inaudible) English, you know, (inaudible).
A PARTICIPANT: No, I don't oppose learning English. I'm talking about, you know, Libya, I mean, how the situation was there. I mean, I learned English since I was a kid.
A PARTICIPANT: (Inaudible) English for three years in the Libyan schools, you know. And I think it was justified at that point, emphasizing the Arabic language and other things and I think every nation has a right to ban any language or subject or something like that. And I think now, we introduce English from the fifth grade. Now we have it in the (inaudible) in the seventh grade, but I think we are going to introduce it from the fifth grade with the computer, you know.
MODERATOR: Next question.
QUESTION: Will you be getting any funding from MEPI or any other organizations or from the U.S. Government to help you more in coordinating this project?
A PARTICIPANT: I would like to answer that.
MR. FARRELL: Yes, I'm always happy to answer that question. The Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs is the primary U.S. Government outlet at the moment that will be providing cooperative ventures, including, you know, scholarship support and other activities on behalf of the United States Government for educational relationships with Libya. The Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, in fact, has a special mandate within the international affairs community in the United States to be able to do these things.
So at this point, we're not looking -- we don't anticipate resources from outside of the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, but we've talked -- we've, since the April visit, we've sponsored visits from our English language coordinator, regional coordinator in Tunis; our regional educational advisor from Rabat has visited Tripoli. There will be other visits over the summer.
This week, we're talking about the support in the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs for American faculty to begin to engage with their colleagues in Libya in the university sector on joint cooperation. And we would -- the Bureau would pay for that.
I think we want -- we've been very careful in taking a step-by-step approach, as has Libya, in settling on priorities. And then we'll -- after this visit, at the conclusion of this visit, both sides will decide where we want to put some emphasis for more resources.
QUESTION: For (inaudible). Did you discuss anything relating to the Libyan role in helping American efforts to (inaudible) Darfur and Sudan?
A PARTICIPANT: No, we don't discuss this here.
QUESTION: How many? (Inaudible.)
A PARTICIPANT: Probably in Tripoli, I don't know. But not here.
QUESTION: How many scholarships are you planning to offer the Libyan side?
MR. FARRELL: We will decide that at the conclusion of the visit. The things that we decided on yesterday were related to senior U.S. faculty traveling to Libya in the next -- beginning in the next few months to collaborate on specific projects in priority fields, whether they are information technology, library science, the development of English materials for teaching. But we need to expand that list after we've completed consultations.
The other thing that we're very careful about, we want to encourage American universities and Libyan institutions to have their own nongovernmental relationships, so we want to see how that develops before we start talking about government-funded scholarships. There's a big -- there's intense interest in Libya and students studying in the United States and the Libyan side has their own resources as well.
MODERATOR: Tom, do you want to go into some details on the schedule, in terms of some of the different meetings and universities that they're --
MR. FARRELL: I'd be happy to. The group has been in Washington since Monday evening. The first day of meetings were focused on the international affairs side of the federal government, the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, the Near Eastern Bureau representatives at the State Department, U.S. Agency for International Development.
This was followed by meetings with the higher education associations to deal -- to discuss matters of mutual concern related to accreditation, testing, standardization, curriculum development, a general overview of the U.S. higher education system. The staff -- all morning we met with representatives of major universities in the Washington, D.C. area -- Georgetown, the George Washington University, the University of Maryland, Howard University -- for frank discussions about how soon the relationships could be reestablished, what was -- what were the current standards for university education.
Tomorrow, we will be meeting with a large number of international exchange organizations and NGOs and then the group will have the weekend free for the Fourth of July holiday, and then Monday proceed to Houston where they will concentrate on the enormous medical center activities in Houston, the Baylor College of Medicine, M.D. Anderson Hospital, Texas Medical Center, also begin to look at our capacity in a community college system at North Harris County Community College.
We also want to introduce -- reintroduce them to the business sector because the American business sector has played a traditional role in supporting scholarship and educational exchange, so there will be meetings with some of the oil industry executives, especially those interested in capacity development, human resource development and education.
And then on to Phoenix, where there will be meetings in Phoenix and Tucson with University of Arizona, Arizona State, the higher education sector, but mostly the state university system. They will have some time to visit the Grand Canyon and then they'll -- that's very nice -- and then they will fly to New York for meetings with foundations, international education organizations, then return to Washington for -- so they can tell us we can join together in formulating a joint policy on next steps at the conclusion of the visit.
QUESTION: So (inaudible) about two weeks, three weeks?
MR. FARRELL: Yes. The 20th. Most of the group will leave on the 20th so it's about --
QUESTION: Three weeks.
MR. FARRELL: Three weeks. Thank you.
Did you want to say something more about the visit?
A PARTICIPANT: Yes. We think that so far this visit has been so fruitful to us. We learned a lot about the programs which may be put available to Libyan universities and Libyan educational systems and the kind of cooperation, the amount of cooperation that we expect to have from the institute of education, institutes of health and the various institutes in this field of education and health development.
We're looking forward to see more people on our journey around the various states; I think there are five states. And, naturally, the whole idea is to establish good links and good relationship with a number of institutions and universities all over the country in order to start creating a joint program to develop our graduate education in Libya, update it, and at the same time, open the opportunities for our graduate students to pursue their post-graduate education in this country.
MR. FARRELL: If you will help protect my reputation here, I would like to add something else that I forgot that's very important, and I wouldn't survive in the bureaucracy if I failed to notice this -- to note this.
We had very constructive meetings with the U.S. Department of Education and we had very constructive meetings with the Department of Health and Human Services, with officials at the Department of Health and Human Services and the National Institutes of Health. And, of course, Health and Human Services and NIH are very central to our relationship because it's so much focused on health and medical care and education.
MODERATOR: Thank you. Don't forget to leave -- don't leave them out. (Laughter.)
QUESTION: How many students from Libya do you expect to apply to the universities in America, like in the coming year?
A PARTICIPANT: At the moment, we have around 500 students ready to come in one group, if we can get them in.
QUESTION: (Inaudible.) (Laughter.)
A PARTICIPANT: But of course, naturally, leaving jokes aside, we understand the difficulty here and we are trying to organize their programs according to certain methods of selections and rerouting their programs through different channels so that they will have the opportunity to pursue their graduate studies in this country. We don't expect the 500 will come together but we hope that eventually they'll be here together in the long run.
QUESTION: And both men and women, of course?
A PARTICIPANT: Yes, yes. Both sexes.
QUESTION: Is the language factor going to play -- going to be an obstacle for the students here, or are the universities going to wait longer (inaudible) to admit students with lower Kaplan scores or GRE scores or did you discuss this or --
A PARTICIPANT: Well, the Kaplan now is becoming an essential requirement by all foreign students whether they are learning in English or in Arab languages, so all students have to pass a couple exams before they get into graduate studies in this country. And we are thinking of organizing this for them either in Libya or somehow by cooperating with some universities here locally.
QUESTION: Have you had any special discussions with the (inaudible)?
A PARTICIPANT: Tomorrow.
QUESTION: Tomorrow?
MR. FARRELL: Yes. They -- we've had -- I think it's very important to know that the U.S. education sector wants very much to have this relationship reestablished and the Educational Testing Service has agreed -- they agreed just before we traveled to Tripoli that they would provide special testing opportunities and training courses for Libyans so that the tests could be administered in the fall.
And you know, we also hope, at the State Department, that a number of NGOs -- not just one NGO, but we hope the level of interest is so high in reestablishing relationship that we hope that a number of NGOs will be interested and that a number of universities or university consortia would be interested in this opportunity to help reestablish an important relationship.
QUESTION: Steve Kaufman from the Washington File. Wanted to ask, on the other hand, have you discussed how many American students you would like to go to Libya and whether you would require them to have, for example, a certain amount of Arabic proficiency or other prerequisites?
MR. FARRELL: The study in Libya of American students has, from the very beginning, been an issue for discussion and we -- I am happy to say that it was received in Tripoli gladly and that we know that there will be opportunities for American students to study in Libya. We, in fact, hope that we can make arrangements or U.S. universities can make arrangements for serious study of Arabic in Libya for young American students.
So, in fact, we were hoping for educational opportunities in Libya that would provide a better quality and deeper capacity in Arabic language. So, I don’t think we'll be requiring -- we won't be requiring a high standard, because we want to send American students there, in many cases, to learn Arabic.
A PARTICIPANT: I may add that, in this regard, it don't have to be that, you know, a student will go and study in one of the Libyan universities for the whole course. But maybe in the areas conducting research, maybe one of the, I mean, American graduate students would be interested in conducting research that is related to the area, related to the Mediterranean Sea or related to the Sahara or the ecosystem or the, I mean, environment in this area. So they would be very welcome to have a joint research program with Libyan universities and research centers and institutes.
MODERATOR: Any more questions?
(No response.)
MODERATOR: Then we thank you very much.
