Scholars at Risk

An organisation under the above name monitors the situation of academics and scholars in the countries with limited or no freedom of speech and reports on the situation of those who are under threat or detained by their governments for speaking the truth or writing about the truth.

In Belarus where people demonstrated against the presidential elections for months, Amnesty International has reported the expulsion of over 150 students from the universities for participating in the demonstrations. European University Associations and European Students Union and Scholars at Risk have called on the Belarus government to decriminalise students and academics.

Safwan Masri, Executive Vice-president of global centre and global development for Universities In Colombia University spoke of increasing atmosphere of xenophobia and general mistrust which creates challenges for education.

In Turkey 21 international NGOs have issued a statement on Serhat Elbayrak, owner of pro-government Turkvaz Media Group, to drop his case against the academic and cyber-rights activist, professor Yaman Akdeniz. He is being sued for tweeting about censorship of reporting on the Paradise Papers. For further information please go to: ahvalnews.com.

Egypt: human rights organisations condemn the rotation of Ahmad Samir Santaway in a new case and call for releasing him. Ahmad Samir is a Central European University student and has been subjected to beating in prison. The detention stems from his research on women’s sexual reproductive rights. For more information go to Scholars at Risk Network.

United Kingdom: Government to help protect research from threats.

The UK government is making plans to advise researchers and academics on how to better protect their work from hostile foreign actors and how to safely engage in international research collaborations. For further information: University World News.