The U.S. government should tighten visa restrictions for students from countries on the State Department's "state sponsors of terrorism" list, according to a report released last week by a Washington-based think tank.

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy report, authored by Institute fellow Hillary Mann, found that students from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria and the Sudan do not undergo sufficiently detailed background checks to dispel the threat of terrorism.

In addition, Mann wrote, the U.S. government does not adequately monitor students from these countries to see if they are studying such sensitive fields as nuclear engineering, chemical engineering and other potentially weaponsrelated subjects.

In 1991, the United Nations uncovered an Iraqi plan to send science and engineering students to the U.S. with the aim of furthering Iraq's nuclear weapons program, the report said.

Harvard student groups yesterday decried the report's conclusions, arguing that foreign undergraduates-particularly students from the countries on the State Department list-might suffer prejudice and exclusion if the report's recommendations are accepted.

"While the threat of terrorism must always be taken very seriously, it is important not to fall prey to an impulse to essentialize the characteristics of the citizens of any one country," said Siddharth Mohandas '00, president of the Woodbridge Society, a campus international student group.

Mohandas said he was concerned that implementing the report might have negative consequences for Muslim students in particular.

"It would be unfortunate if such restrictions were to reinforce alreadyheld negative and largely false associations between Islam and international terrorism," Mohandas said.

Harvard Islamic Society president Mitsuru Watanabe '96-'98 said the American public should not judge all citizens, of the Middle East countries noted in the report to be terrorists.

"Any students from such countries that are here for the noble and peaceful purpose of acquiring knowledge as espoused by Islam," Watanabe said.

The numbers of Harvard students from the five monitored countries are comparatively small, according to the Harvard International Office.

Five Iranian students are currently in the University, one in the School of Public Health, two in the School of Dental Medicine and two in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, according to the office.

Iraq and Syria each have one student in the University. The Iraqi student is in the School of Public Health, and the Syrian student is enrolled at the Law School.

Harvard has two Sudanese students, both of whom are undergraduates.

No Libyan students are currently enrolled at Harvard