Associated Press
Friday, December 20, 2002; Page A31

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 19 -- The chairman of President Bush's bioethics council accused Stanford University today of trying to conceal the true nature of its stem cell research plan.

The school insists its new cancer institute will not clone human embryos for medical research, and that it intends to experiment with nuclear transfer techniques. But many consider such work to be cloning.

In a statement posted on the university's Web site last week, Stanford claimed the President's Council on Bioethics supported its view -- and its planned research.

But the council, which officially considers such work to be "cloning for biomedical research," demanded a public apology from Stanford for "obfuscating the nature of such research." On Wednesday, Stanford deleted all references to the panel.

"Stanford has decided to proceed with cloning research without public scrutiny and deliberation, and has hurt the cause of public understanding of this subject by its confusion of the issue," said the council's chairman, Dr. Leon R. Kass of the University of Chicago.