In advance of UN Human Rights Council (HRC 47), Scholars at Risk urges COHOM and the Human Rights Council to take measures to address the ongoing attacks on the higher education community in Belarus, and to support students and scholars who continue to suffer arrests, detentions, prosecutions, expulsions, and wrongful dismissals. This focus would align with commitments made under the EU Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy 2020-2024 to support action to protect academic freedom, and the autonomy of education institutions, and to “[d]eepen engagement with and enhance support for pluralistic civil society, including […] academics, […] in order to defend their right to exercise their roles free from any form of intimidation, discrimination or violence.”

Read our submission in full here.