Oregon Health & Science University agreed this week to give an animal-rights group more than 113,000 pages of records about the care of monkeys used in research.

The university’s decision ended a long battle by the group, In Defense of Animals, for documents about the animals kept at the Oregon National Primate Research Center, which the university manages, The Oregonian reported today.

The group requested the records eight years ago and sued the university in 2001 to obtain them. The university demanded that the group pay more than $150,000 to cover the costs of producing the records. The university said it needed to black out the names of researchers to avoid potential threats against them by animal-rights extremists.

But last year, the Oregon Court of Appeals ruled that the fee was excessive, a move that led to the university’s decision.

A spokesman for the group said he expected the documents to show that some animals had been mistreated. But university officials said the records showed that the primate center had met all federal laws and regulations.

Animal-rights groups have challenged universities in other states to get access to animal-care records (The Chronicle, March 31).