Protest brews over Cheney center at Univ. of Wyo.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. – A decision by the University of Wyoming to name a new center for international students for former Vice President Dick Cheney is drawing criticism from people who say Cheney's support for the Iraq war and harsh interrogation techniques should disqualify him from the distinction.

The former vice president and wife Lynne are expected to attend Thursday's dedication of the new Cheney International Center on the Laramie campus.

Protesters plan to be there, too.

The center is funded in part with $3.2 million the Cheneys donated to the university in several installments while he was vice president.

The university's decision to name the center after Cheney, a former Wyoming congressman, prompted a petition that collected more than 150 signatures. The petition said polices of the Bush administration were "very controversial" and the name will affect how people perceive the center.

Cheney's support for harsh interrogations — torture, some say — is one reason to oppose naming the center after him, said Suzanne Pelican, who began circulating the petition a year ago.

Pelican also criticized the Bush administration's "go it alone" strategy when several U.S. allies opposed the invasion of Iraq and didn't participate in the war.

"We feel that by naming it the Cheney International Center, that the programs and UW can't avoid being identified with that ideology and that approach to global politics that the Bush-Cheney administration championed," Pelican said Tuesday.