INDONESIAN GRADUATES EYE MALAYSIA FOR FURTHER STUDIES, SAYS UTM VC

By Mohd Nasir Yusoff

SURABAYA, Nov 13 (Bernama) -- Indonesian graduates are now eyeing Malaysia
for their postgraduate studies, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) Vice
Chancellor Prof k Ir Dr Zaini Ujang said.

At UTM's Skudai campus alone, there were 199 Indonesians pursuing masters
and doctorate degrees from the total of 4,685 postgraduate students, he said
recently.

He said postgraduate students made up 36 percent of all UTM students and 25
percent of the postgraduate students came from other countries which included
Iran (353), Libya (125), Iraq (81), Sudan (65), Yemen (61), Nigeria (39), Saudi
Arabia (33), Pakistan (22), Khazakhstan (17) and China (13).

The rest were from 20 other countries such as Germany, France and Turkey,
he told Bernama here where he obtained the International Cooperation Award from
the 48-year-old Surabaya November 10 Technology Institute for his and UTM's
contributions in forging academic cooperation with the institute.

The cooperation began 10 years ago.

Zaini said Malaysia had drawn many Indonesian graduate students not only
because of geographical and socio-cultural factors but also the programmes
offered by the universities aimed at assisting them, most of whom were
self-financed.

Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (Technology University of Malaysia) is the
oldest public engineering and technology university in Malaysia and is known by
the abbreviation UTM.
-- BERNAMA