On March 15th, 2012, UC Irvine undergraduate students, by way of the Associated Students of UCI, passed a legislation that took a stance against the brutal Bashar Al-Assad regime of Syria. ASUCI's Legislative Council chose to cut ties with Hazem Chehabi, the Syrian honorary Consul General of Newport Beach and the chair of the UCI Board of Trustees. Hazem Chehabi has continued to serve as Syrian Consul General and has not issued a statement condemning the Al-Assad regime. Moreover, he remains strongly associated to the university through his position on the UCI Foundation. The legislation calls upon “the University administration and the UC Irvine Foundation Trustees [to] take the necessary actions to remove Hazem Chehabi from his position as Chair of the Board of Trustees, as he is an official representative of a government that continues to systematically violate human rights.”