Tunis — Tunis, October 23, 2008- The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) has recently elected two new Tunisian members during a ceremony organized in Glasgow, Scotland.

They are respectively, Mr Ridha Methnani in the field of Human and Social Sciences and Mr Mohamed Aoussat Ayari, in engineering.

Mr Methnani is a university professor and an academician. He is a member of several national and international organisations in the sector of information and communications. He is also the author of a book entitled "The Knowledge Society and Development".

Mr Mohamed Aoussat Ayari, is an advisor with the American space Agency NASA where he is also in charge of the "Lead Structural Systems Engineering". He has notably contributed to solving critical problems on the main mirror of the Hubble spatial telescope.

The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) was founded in 1960, in Stockholm, Sweden. The aims of the IAA is to foster the development of astronautics for peaceful purposes , to recognize individuals who have distinguished themselves in a branch of science or technology related to astronautics and to provide a program through which the membership can contribute to the advancement of space science.

The 1213 members of the academy come from approximately 75 countries.