LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Textbooks promoting violence and jihad that were created under the guidance of the University of Nebraska at Omaha and distributed in Afghanistan contributed to the terroristic culture that led to the Sept. 11 attacks, a peace group told the university's Board of Regents Friday.

Nebraskans for Peace asked the university to study the work of UNO's Center for Afghan Studies and to strengthen ethics policies that would govern work of the center.

Paul Olson, a member of the statewide peace organization and also an English professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, told the regents that evidence he has collected indicates that actions of the Afghan Studies program appear to violate written and unwritten principles of the university, such as violating human rights.

Textbooks created and distributed by the center in the 1980s and 1990s were adopted by the Taliban for widespread use in Afghan schools, Olson said. Those textbooks promoted violence and jihad, Olson said, in apparent violation of regents policy that prohibits departments from providing educational materials violating recognized human rights protections.

"We provided the violence-laden propaganda to the Taliban-era Afghan children," Olson said. "The 9/11 terrorists emerged from this context."

In accordance with board policy, there was no opportunity for any of the members to react to Olson's comments.

However, in a March 7 letter to Nebraskans for Peace, Board of Regents Chairman Howard Hawks defended the work of the center.

American universities involved with the textbook production, which in addition to UNO included the University of Wyoming and Columbia University, had no involvement or responsibility for their content, Hawks said.

The U.S. Congress, through the State Department, mandated that the books' contents be determined solely by Afghans working with the various institutions, Hawks said.

The content was developed by Afghans for literacy courses for illiterate Afghan Mujahideen who were fighting Soviet forces, Hawks said. None of the textbooks in question were produced after 1989, and none were intended for use by children, he said.

However, Hawks said textbooks were defaced by members of the Taliban and redistributed within Afghanistan later.

Textbooks currently used in Afghanistan are the work of President Hamid Karzai's administration, Hawks said.

The UNO center was awarded three major contracts by the United States Agency for International Development covering 1974-1978, 1986-1994 and 2002-2004, Hawks said in the letter. More than 50 faculty and staff members at UNO and UNL worked on the projects, under which more than 30 million textbooks were produced for Afghanistan children and adults, Hawks said.

At Friday's meeting, officials distributed a one-page information sheet that was prepared by Thomas Gouttierre, director of UNO's Afghanistan Studies center, according to NU administration official Dara Troutman. The unsigned statement said that the center is proud of its record in assisting Afghans to rebuild their education sector.

The statement does not address Olson's claims, but instead lists what are described as highlights of the center's work, including the development of maps, writing chapters for encyclopedias on Afghanistan and making thousands of appearances to talk about the country.

Gouttierre was out of the office Friday and did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Olson's appearance before the board is the latest in a series of communications Nebraskans for Peace has had with the university related to the Afghan Studies program dating back to January.

On the Net: University of Nebraska at Omaha Center for Afghanistan Studies: http://www.unomaha.edu/.875world/cas/

Nebraskans for Peace: http://www.nebraskansforpeace.org/