Iran: Verbatim Copying Not “Scientific Theft”

ran has now taken a stand on the plagiarism scandal that has engulfed two government ministers after substantial portions of their research articles were discovered to be verbatim copies of other scientists’ published work. According to a member of the Iranian parliament who was part of the government investigation, copying in this case isn’t plagiarism because the results are "a genuine scientific work." (He said it here, in Persian.) Meanwhile, a junior Iranian scientist who wrote two of the papers says he was responsible but also denies it counts as plagiarism.