Thursday December 11, 2008
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Professor Mansour Farhang served as an advisor to the Iranian foreign ministry and as ambassador to the United Nations following the 1979 revolution. He later resigned in protest when the Khomeini regime refused to accept the U.N. Commission of Inquiry's recommendation to release American hostages in Teheran. Early in the Iran-Iraq war, he also served as envoy in negotiations with international peace missions. During his ambassadorship, Dr. Farhang wrote and spoke about the threat of religious extremists who had come to dominate the course of the Iranian revolution. He sought refuge in United States in the fall of 1981, following the violent suppression of political dissidents in Iran . He has been teaching international relations and Middle Eastern Politics at Bennington College in Vermont since 1983. Mansour Farhang currently serves on the advisory board of Middle East Watch, a branch of Human Rights Watch, an organization dedicated to protecting the human rights of people around the world. And in the media, he's one of the most sought-after experts on the Middle East , appearing as a guest on numerous national and international radio and television programs
He holds a BA from the University of Arizona (1965) and a PhD from Claremont Graduate School (1970).
Books:
U.S. Press and Iran : Foreign Policy and the Journalism of Deference (Univ. of California, 1987)
U.S. Imperialism: From the Spanish-American War to the Iranian Revolution (South End Press, 1981).
