Academic linked to Gaddafi's fugitive son leaves LSE

David Held was adviser to Saif al-Islam Gaddafi at the university and director of a research programme funded by his charity

guardian.co.uk, Jeevan Vasagar, education editor, Monday 31 October 2011

Gaddafi's fugitive son, Saif al-Islam studied at LSE and his charity funded
 a research programme at the university. Photograph: Paul Hackett/Reuters

A British academic with close links to Muammar Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam has left the London School of Economics before a report on the university's relationship with Libya is published.

David Held was an academic adviser to the toppled dictator's son when he studied at the LSE and was director of the research programme funded by his charity.

Held, who is currently Graham Wallas professor of political science at the LSE, has announced that he is leaving in January to take up a post at Durham University.

The LSE is expected to face sharp criticism over the academic independence of the North Africa Research Programme, which was funded with a £1.5m donation from the Gaddafi charitable foundation, and Held's departure is regarded internally as the latest aftershock from the donation. The LSE's links with Libya have already triggered the resignation of its director, Howard Davies.

Held has extensive ties to Saif al-Islam, now on the run after the violent collapse of his father's dictatorship. Held was on the board of the Gaddafi foundation, the charity run by Saif al-Islam.

He was appointed to the board of the charity on 28 June 2009, a few days after the gift was discussed and accepted by the LSE council, the university's governing body. He subsequently resigned from the charity on the LSE council's advice.

The donation – of which £300,000 was received – was paid to a research centre LSE Global Governance, of which Held was co-director.

Saif al-Islam was allowed to lay out "objectives and expectations" for the programme, according to leaked LSE documents.

Lord Woolf, a former lord chief justice, has completed an independent inquiry into the university's Libyan links. Its publication has been delayed pending the results of a separate inquiry into allegations of plagiarism in Saif al-Islam's PhD thesis.

Held is taking up a new position as master of University College and chair of politics and international relations at Durham University.

An LSE insider said that he expected the Woolf inquiry report to criticise the "close consultations" between LSE scholars and the Gaddafi regime. The funding was accepted despite internal protest. Fred Halliday, a distinguished Middle East expert at the LSE, criticised the donation in a letter that described the country's rulers as a "secretive, erratic and corrupt elite".

The letter calls Held "the leading proponent of our accepting this grant".

Held viewed Saif al-Islam as a potential reformer.

The academic introduced the dictator's son when Saif al-Islam delivered the Ralph Miliband memorial lecture at the LSE last May, telling the audience: "I've come to know Saif as someone who looks to democracy, civil society and deep liberal values as the core of his inspiration."

The North Africa Research Programme was suspended when the Libyan uprising began this year, while LSE Global Governance was closed at the end of July. The LSE has agreed to put £300,000 – equivalent to the cash it has received from the Gaddafi foundation to set up the research programme – into a scholarship for north African students.

Held said in a statement: "I will be taking up the positions of master of University College and chair of politics and international relations at the University of Durham from January.

"This move is being made for academic reasons and I look forward to the new avenues of research that this role will bring. I have many links to LSE which will be maintained in the years ahead."

An LSE spokesman said: "Prof Held was offered, and has taken up, a position at Durham University. This is a personal decision made by Prof Held for academic reasons."

Referring to the Woolf inquiry report, the university's spokesman added: "No donor can expect to influence the academic content of research. I don't know what the report says but that has always been our understanding and our strong expectation."