The fifth meeting of the heads of the top universities of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Russian Federation was held on Tuesday, 7 July 2020, with the presence of the ministers of science, research and technology, ambassadors and heads of the top universities of the two countries hosted by Russia and Dr. Nasiri Gheidari, president of the Shahid Beheshti University made a speech.
He did gratitude from Professor Sadovichi, President of Moscow State University, and Dr. Nili Ahmadabadi, President of the University of Tehran, as the secretaries of the meeting to hold this meeting, and expressed the outlines of educational, research and technology cooperation between Shahid Beheshti University and Russia.
Dr. Nasiri Gheidari, first referring to the responsibility of Shahid Beheshti University as the “leading house for International Scientific Cooperation with Russia”, announced the membership of 51 Iranian universities and research institutes in this committee, noted the hold of five meetings of this committee (the last meeting on 16 Jun 2020 was held virtually) so far.
In addition, he mentioned the formation of the “International Policy Council” on Russia at Shahid Beheshti University, with the participation of current, previous and former advisers of Islamic Republic of Iran in Russia, Deputy of the Center for International Scientific Cooperation of the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, General Director of Scholarships and Student Dispatch, Representative of the Vice Presidency for Science and Technology, Director of the Aerospace Research Institute, Director of the National Institute of Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences, President of the Islamic Azad University and other veteran colleagues, he said that good prospects are being drawn in this think tank for future cooperation with Russian educational and research centers.
Dr. Nasiri Gheidari, enumerating the number of held technical meetings in the field of scientific relations with Russia in the past 5 months, said that this issue shows the interest of Shahid Beheshti University in developing relations with Russian universities and research institutes.
He also referred to the 11 Memorandum of Understanding of cooperation since 2015, held 9 joint scientific meetings, 15 visits of academic delegations to educational and research centers of the two countries, 7 joint research projects, the presence of 14 faculty members of Shahid Beheshti University in prestigious conferences. He also mentioned the participation of 15 Russian professors in conferences held at Shahid Beheshti University, and some other statistics related to bilateral cooperation.
The President of Shahid Beheshti University then counted the number of faculty members graduating from Russia (13 faculty members) and stated that in general, about one third of the faculty members of Shahid Beheshti University have graduated from abroad, which is a very high capacity to promote international scientific cooperation.
He considered the establishment of “Researchers Search System” of Shahid Beheshti University as one of the important and basic measures taken by the director of international scientific cooperation of this university and the development of the system with the approval of the Acting Minister for International Scientific Cooperation, at the national level to facilitate identification and communication with Iranian researchers in the near future.
He also added that another activity carried out by this directorate was the launch of a scientific cooperation website with Russia, in order to collect and integrate information related to the educational and research activities of the universities and research institutes of the two countries with the aim of developing a strategic cooperation plan.
At the end of his speech, Dr. Nasiri referred to the efforts of Shahid Beheshti University as the leading house for international scientific cooperation with Russia, in guiding and organizing the country’s students to use the Russian Government Scholarship 2020-2021, and also he explained the strategies and approaches to promote international scientific cooperation with Russia.