Paleonet: Should science as a whole be considered in embargo issues?

[David Kopaska-Merkel]

I wonder if the message you received is truthful & came from its ostensible sender.

David

David C Kopaska-Merkel
Geological Survey of Alabama
Box 869999
Tuscaloosa AL 35486-6999
205-247-3695
www.gsa.state.al.us<http://www.gsa.state.al.us>
fax 205-349-2861

Geology ends when the Universe is reduced to protons and photons.
________________________________
From: paleonet-bounces at nhm.ac.uk [mailto:paleonet-bounces at nhm.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Bruno Granier
Sent: Friday, May 03, 2013 3:19 AM
To: paleonet at nhm.ac.uk
Subject: Paleonet: Should science as a whole be considered in embargo issues?

Hi,
I received a puzzling message (partly duplicated) below from a well-known publishing house.
I am not an US but a French citizen (in France a call for embargo is not legal) and I am worried about the implications.
US have an embargo on Cuba (but it probably does not apply to science as a whole). Probably the same issue with North Korea!?... Other countries probably do the same with Israel!?...

I can get the point when the topic is nuclear science, virology, ...
but why should this censorship apply to paleontology, stratigraphy, ... ?

US editors and reviewers can no longer handle submissions by authors employed by the Government of Iran
The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the US Department of the Treasury administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions. As a result of OFAC sanctions we have been made aware that US editors, US Elsevier staff and US reviewers are now unable to handle scientific manuscripts where any of the authors are employed by the Government of Iran. This includes the research departments of the various oil and gas companies which are deemed to be entities of the Government of Iran.
(...)
When rejecting manuscripts which fall under this OFAC regulation please use the new EES Decision Term "Reject - OFAC Sanctions" and the following text:
"As a result of OFAC sanctions all editorial staff who are US-based/US nationals are unable to handle scientific manuscripts which are authored by Iranian scientists, employed by the Government of Iran. Based on this OFAC regulation we are unfortunately unable to handle your manuscript. We wish you success with your submission to another Journal."

The full version of the text can be found at
http://mail.elsevier-alerts.com/go.asp?/bESJ001/mTR68G9F/uQX51PJB/xD82RH9F&utm_source=ESJ001&SIS_ID=&utm_term=20130430%20Iran%20OFAC%20Sanctions%20NON%20INC&utm_campaign=&utm_content=&utm_medium=email&bid=V9HZG9F:QX51PJB

Or may be there are too shy ... Why didn't they suggest to not cite papers by Iranian authors who are/were "employed by the Government of Iran" etc. ?

Bruno Granier
Brest, France
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