I received today an email from a reader who has tried to explore the links between Mr. Osmanagic’s Foundation and Italian Universities. Here is, with his authorization, the result of his inquiries.
Irna

I was intrigued to see this link on the Foundation website recently - http://www.piramidasunca.ba/en/index.php/ITALIAN-SCIENTIFIC-TEAM-ESTABLISHED-TO-INVESTIGATE-THE-BOSNIAN-PYRAMIDS.html ?

I was particularly interested in this statement: “‘SB Research Group’ is an inter-university and inter-disciplinary team established by Universities of Trieste and Milan. Coordinator of the group of seven members is professor Paolo Debertolis. Group consists of medicine anthropologist, architects, engineers, etc.”

The link takes one here - http://www.sbresearchgroup.eu/index.php?lang=en - and also here http://www.sbresearchgroup.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=21&Itemid=123&lang=en, where I found this statement: “This research project combines elements of two Italian Universities, Trieste and Milan,”

So, on reading this, I gained the impression that the authorities of these two universities, impressed by the work of the Foundation, had agreed to join forces with it.

But, strange to relate, when I went to the University of Trieste website - http://www.units.it/ - and searched for "SB Group", I couldn’t find anything on SB - http://www.units.it/search/sitemap/index.php?scope=SB#firstmatch. I found this, http://www.openstarts.units.it/dspace/handle/10077/3660 , some research about the ethnic identity of Bosnians in Tuzla ... and this, http://www.viaggioadriatico.it/ViaggiADR/cisva/search?SearchableText=Bosnia&submit=Search, inter-University studies on travel in the Adriatic - but nothing on the SB Research Group.

So, disappointed, but still hoping to find information about Italian university links with the SB Research Group, I turned to the University of Milan website - http://www.unimi.it/ENG/. But, astonishingly, a search for "SB" turned up nothing - http://www.unimi.it/gsasearch/search?q=SB&btnG=Vai&sort=date:D:L:d1&frontend=unimi&num=15&getfields=authorization&site=unimi|sba|cosp|facolta&filter=0 ; while a search for "Bosnia" revealed, for example, documents such as this one mentioning some research on old bridges in Bosnia - http://www.letterefilosofia.unimi.it/img/common/Violante.pdf - etc. etc. etc. ... But otherwise, nothing.

So how can the universities of Trieste and Milan have set up this inter-university team - even if consisting of only seven people - but not have mentioned it on their websites? Obviously, it’s fine for a university lecturer or professor to set up an informal group of colleagues who have a common research interest, if they want to: but, if the group is informal, it would surely be wrong to claim or imply that it was an official group "established by Universities of Trieste and Milan" ... :(

Abacus