University cancels venue booking over EU lecture advertising

The University of Iceland cancelled a booking for a lecture on Iceland and the European Union after deciding that the event’s advertising made it appear too political, mbl.is reports. Rector Silja Bára Ómarsdóttir said the decision was based on how the advertisement was presented, not on who was due to speak.

“It is not about who is speaking. It is about who is trying to book this hall,” Ómarsdóttir told mbl.is, referring to the university’s ceremonial hall.

Former University of Iceland professors Hannes Hólmsteinn Gissurarson and Ragnar Árnason have demanded that the university honour a recent rental agreement with Árnason for the planned event.

Dr Carl Baudenbacher, a former president of the EFTA Court and a leading expert on the European Economic Area Agreement and European law, was scheduled to speak at the meeting.

Ómarsdóttir said the advertisements indicated that Áfram Ísland was organising the event. “There is no other way to interpret it when advertisements are published in this way,” she said, adding that the issue was not who would appear on stage.

In a letter to the rector, Gissurarson and Árnason said that the Research Centre for Politics and Economics, rather than Áfram Ísland, was organising the meeting. They referred to an advertisement published in Morgunblaðið on August 6 in the centre’s name, alongside the logos of Áfram Ísland and Almenna bókafélagið, which they said were drawing attention to Baudenbacher’s lecture.

Asked whether she believed the two former professors were wrong about who was organising the event, Ómarsdóttir said she was assessing the advertisement as it appeared in the newspaper and that the university had made its decision on that basis.

The letter said organisations and individuals outside the university had often worked with university institutions on events and promoted them, without previously facing objections. Ómarsdóttir said she was not aware of such cases, apart from think tanks associated with Gissurarson, where research centres he leads had advertised events held at the university.

She said outside organisations could promote such events, but objected to the advertisement because it displayed the logos of two organisations above the words “in cooperation with the Research Centre”. In her view, that did not show that the research centre was organising the event and led the university to cancel the booking.