The University of Basrah is a non-profit, public university in the city of Basra, in southern Iraq. For historic reasons, the final -h is retained on Basrah in the name of the university.
Originally an offshoot of the University of Baghdad, the university became an independent body in 1964, when it had four faculties of arts, science, engineering and law.
Today, there are about 100,000 undergraduate students and nearly 5,000 staff in 20 colleges over three campuses around the city of Basra, each with research facilities and student halls of residence for both domestic and international students.
The Northern Campus of Qarmat Ali contains the colleges of pharmacy, veterinary medicine, engineering, science, education, agriculture and physical Education. The Southern Campus of Bab Al Zubayer contains the colleges of business and economics, law, arts, historical studies, fine arts. The College of Medicine Campus contains the college of medicine and the teaching hospital. The College of Dentistry Campus contains the college of dentistry.
The university awards degrees of BA, BSc, Higher Diploma, MA, MSc and PhD levels.
The University of Basrah conducts research through various research centres in areas such as marine sciences, polymer studies, Arabian Gulf studies, date palm research, education counselling, teaching methods development, living languages and the city of Basra itself.
Other centres include the Desalination Unit, the Natural History Museum, the Haemoglobinopathy Unit, the Internet Resources Centre, the Central Library, and the Publishing House.
The university motto translates into English as, “And say: My Lord! Increase me in knowledge”.
