The INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF UNIVERSITIES (IAU), founded in 1950, is a worldwide organization, with Member Institutions in some 130 countries, which co-operates with a vast network of international, regional and national bodies. Its permanent Secretariat, the International Universities Bureau, is located at UNESCO, Paris, France and provides a wide variety of services to Member Institutions and to the international higher education community at large. The Association aims at giving expression to the obligation of universities and other higher education institutions as social institutions to promote, through teaching, research and services, the principles of freedom and justice, of human dignity and solidarity, and contributes, through international cooperation, to the development of material and moral assistance for the strengthening of higher education generally.