Maine university cancels conference featuring anti-Israel U.N. rapporteur Albanese

"The University of Southern Maine (USM) has canceled an agreement to host the ‘Consequence of Palestine’ conference, which was set to feature Francesca Albanese, a UN special rapporteur known for her anti-Israel bias who was recently sanctioned by the US government, JNS reported.

The day-long event, scheduled for February 28, was to be held in the school’s Hannaford Hall and organized by USM's criminology and sociology department, in collaboration with the Maine Coalition for Palestine and Maine Voices for Palestinian Rights.

The university informed JNS that it rescinded the agreement after discovering that one of the speakers, Albanese, is sanctioned by the US government and appears on the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) list of specially designated nationals and blocked persons. This list legally prohibits US individuals and entities from engaging in any transactions with those included.

In a statement, USM explained that its decision was in response to the legal restrictions on dealing with individuals on the OFAC list.

Albanese has continued to face widespread criticism over her anti-Israel statements. She was recently condemned by several European Union foreign ministers for comments made at an Al Jazeera conference, in which Albanese had said: ‘The fact that instead of stopping Israel, most of the world has armed, given Israel political excuses, political sheltering, economic and financial support ... We who do not control large amounts of financial capitals, algorithms and weapons, we now see that we as a humanity have a common enemy.’..."