Brown and White Vol. 135 no. 14

              The Brown and White Vol. 135 No. 14
Friday, October 26, 2018 ‘All the Lehigh News First’
Tough talks with top leaders
Lehigh students engage with US, Iranian officials at embassy
By CHRISTOPHER D’AGOSTINO
B&W Staff
Students met with the Iranian
Ambassador to the United Nations
on Friday, Oct. 19, through Lehigh’s
partnership with the United
Nations.
Lehigh students talked to John
Brevaco, a U.S. senior diplomat to
the United Nations, and Gholamali
Khoshroo, Iran’s ambassador to the
UN.
In light of President Trump’s
recent abandonment of the Iran
nuclear deal, Bill Hunter, the direc-tor
of fellowship advising and U.N.
programs, said the meeting was a
relevant educational opportunity for
Lehigh students.
“Clearly our countries are at odds
with each other,” he said. “It is
important to hear the other coun-try’s
perspective.”
The LU/UN Partnership planned
the trip to the U.S. and Iranian
Missions as an experiential learning
opportunity for interested students
and those enrolled in a class taught
by Taylor Benjamin-Britton, a polit-ical
science professor.
“This semester, we’ve been focus-ing
on the role of the United Nations
in mitigating interstate tensions
and one of the major tensions right
now is regarding nuclear weapons,”
Benjamin-Britton said. “So, I saw
(this trip) as an educational oppor-
Courtesy of Bill Hunter
Students met with the Iranian Ambassador in New York City on a trip organized through the LU/UN Partnership on Friday, Oct. 19,
2018. During the meeting, students from the partnership planned a trip to the U.S. and Iranian Missions as an experiental learning
opportunity for both students and professors alike.
tunity that was impossible to resist.”
After an off-the-record meeting
with Brevaco at the U.S. Mission,
the students were escorted to the
Iranian Mission to meet Khoshroo.
There was a welcome reception
and presentation on the history of
Iran from Khoshroo, as well as an
open Q&A session with the Iranian
Although Khoshroo didn’t answer
her question directly, Walker said
Khoshroo implied the U.S. would
need to apologize or have to agree to
come back to the Iran deal.
“The contents of both conversa-tions
included things that were
ambassador.
Benjamin-Britton said the Q&A
session fostered honest and candid
conversation between senior diplo-mats
and students.
During the session, Ana Walker,
’19, asked Khoshroo if he pre-dicts
more amicable relations with
the United States in the future. See UN Page 3
Travel ban imposes limits on international students
Courtesy of George Halal
George Halal, ‘19, center, is a Lehigh senior of Syrian and Lebanese descent. Halal is
one of a handful of Lehigh students affected by President Donald Trump’s travel ban,
which has had an impact not only on family life, but also on student life.
By ANDREW ISAACSON
B&W Staff
George Halal, ’19, has not vis-ited
his home country of Syria
since 2012 because of the ongoing
civil war.
He has not visited his fami-ly,
now in Lebanon, since 2016
because if he leaves America, he
runs the risk of deportation upon
attempted return.
Halal said the Christmas and
New Year’s holidays he now
spends in America have been
lonely and quiet — the campus
is bare, and he doesn’t find him-self
surrounded by the comfort of
family.
On Jan. 27, 2017, President
Donald Trump issued an execu-tive
order that banned citizens
from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya,
Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from
entering the United States for
90 days. Although the ban was
initially blocked by district courts
and rejected by federal appeals
courts, a revised version was most
recently upheld by the Supreme
Court in June 2018.
President Trump’s travel ban
has had a direct impact on inter-national
students at Lehigh, par-ticularly
those who cannot return
to their home countries.
“Even though I am exempted
from the travel ban as a student,
I was advised by my lawyer to
not leave the country, because
Customs and Border Protection
at the airport have the final dis-cretion
and the airlines have dis-cretion
before that,” Halal said.
“There have been many cases
where citizens of these countries
were denied entry to the U.S.,
even when exempted from that
law. Therefore, there is a high
chance that I wouldn’t be able to
re-enter if I leave.”
Despite not being able to
migrate back to the Middle East,
Halal is motivated to apply for
his doctorate in physics and has
made the most out of his summer
experiences. He spent last sum-mer
conducting research at Yale
and the previous summer at both
Ohio State and Lehigh.
See BAN Page 3