Image: Etienne Ansotte, European Union 2019
Commission says it will support civil society, but is criticised for previously ‘ignoring’ academic repression
EU leaders have said they will continue to support civil society in Belarus, after a widely criticised presidential election sparked mass protests in the country, which led to a violent crackdown from the state led by six-term president Alexander Lukashenko.
Their support means the EU looks set to continue funding academic initiatives in Belarus, but some have warned this could indirectly help prop up Lukashenko.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen (pictured) said on 19 August, after a videoconference in which EU member state leaders discussed the situation in Belarus, that the EU would “increase our support to the people of Belarus” in light of the “rigged” election.
She announced the EU would send €53 million of extra funding to the country, of which €50m would be emergency support for the health system as it tries to handle Covid-19. She said €2m would “assist the victims of repression and unacceptable state violence” and €1m would support civil society and independent media.
“It is more important than ever to be there for the Belarus people and to reprogramme money away from the authorities and towards civil society and vulnerable groups,” von der Leyen said.
But Vladimir Dounaev, former vice-rector of the European Humanities University (EHU) in Lithuania, criticised the lack of scrutiny applied to previous EU support for Belarusian higher education, which he said often acts as a tool of the authoritarian regime.
“EU cooperation with Belarusian universities ignores the problem of academic values and academic repression,” he said.
“We have repeatedly tried to draw the attention of EU officials to this,” said Dounaev, who helped found EHU, which was forced to relocate from Belarus’s capital Minsk in 2004 after state attacks on its autonomy. “So far nothing has come of it.”
Von der Leyen said in her statement that the EU already provides “a lot of support” for Belarus through its Eastern Partnership programme, which has sought to support development in Belarus and other Eurasian countries for over a decade.
Belarusian researchers have participated in the 2014-20 EU R&D and academic mobility programmes, Horizon 2020 and Eramus+, with funding coming in part directly from those programmes and in part from an Eastern Partnership spending pot. Belarus has won €6.5m from Horizon 2020, Commission figures show, while about 2,000 students and academics came to the EU under Erasmus+ between 2015-19, with about 1,000 going to Belarus.
The Commission told Research Professional News that “the EU is fully committed to upholding academic values of research and conduct, including in the implementation of the Erasmus+ programme”.
On 14 August, the Socialists and Democrats group in the European Parliament said it wanted to expel Belarus from the Eastern Partnership in response to the election and the state handling of peaceful protestors. Leaders of other major political groups then joined the S&D group on 17 August in calling for the EU to “reconsider” its relations with Belarus, including through the partnership programme.
However, national leaders appear to favour sanctions targeted at specific individuals connected with the Belarusian state, and maintaining support for civil society.
The Bologna Process, a Eurasian standards-setting club for universities, required Belarus to do more to ensure institutional autonomy as a condition of joining the process, but experts have told Research Professional News the country has a long way to go to achieve this.
Last year, a global index of academic freedom produced by researcher Katrin Kinzelbach and colleagues for the Global Public Policy Institute gave Belarus a score of 0.23 out of 1, placing it in the second-lowest category.
This article was updated on 21 August with the response from the Commission.