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From the Stanford Daily


\CISRAELI GEOPHYSICIST DENIED RUSSIAN VISA

\Cby John Freed

\J	Stanford geophysicist  and Israeli citizen  Amos M.  Nur will
not receive  a visa to attend  an international scientific conference
in Russia, Soviet authorities have decided.

	That  government's  Intourist  bureau,  after  ignoring   two
earlier  visa requests,  cabled here  Tuesday that  Nur would  not be
allowed  to  present  a  paper  on  groundwater  movements  preceding
earthquakes.   Nur, famed  in  his  field  for  works  on  earthquake
prediction,  said the  visa was  denied because  he is  a  citizen of
Israel.

	"I think the  most likely reason  is that I  have an  Israeli
passport.  In fact, that is the reason," Nur commented last night.

	Geophysics Prof. Robert L. Kovach, co-author of the paper Nur
planned to present, received a visa more than one month ago.  He will
attend the conference without Nur.

	"It's always a big question as to whether you  should boycott
a conference,  telling your  friends and associates  not to  go," Nur
stated.   "You embarrass  the Russian government,  but you...also can
cause trouble for other scientists [in Russia] as well."

	Nur explained that the  Soviet Union might have  taken action
against  the scientist-hosts  in  the event  of a  boycott.   Kovach,
saying he was "not surprised" that  Nur was denied a visa,  commented
that similar decisions had occurred before.

	"The Russians pulled  this...[in] a similar meeting  in 1971.
They wouldn't  let the people from  Formosa-China in," Kovach pointed
out.

	Nur is president-elect of  the tectonophysics section of  the
American Geophysical  Union (AGU),  which will protest  the Russians'
action  to its parent  International Union of  Geodesy and Geophysics
(IUGG).

	"The IUGG...[has] decided  that no internationally  sponsored
conference  will take place  in a country  which excludes...qualified
scientists," Nur  said.   "Scientists  feel  it's important  to  keep
politics separated from science."

	The AGU  will announce today  what action  it plans to  take,
according to Nur.  Apparently, the University does not plan to make a
separate protest.  Vice Provost Robert M. Rosenzweig said he knows of
no planned University response.

	"I  haven't heard  a word  [about it],"  Rosenzweig remarked.
"I've  been so preoccupied  with other  matters that I  haven't had a
chance to think about it."\.