
SAR’s Academic Freedom Monitoring Project investigates and reports attacks on higher education with the aim of raising awareness, generating advocacy, and increasing protection for scholars, students, and academic communities. Learn more.
Reported Attacks on Higher Education
For date range: January 29, 2020 - January 28, 2021
Results
On January 7, 2021, Visva-Bharati University (VBU) suspended professor Sudipta Bhattacharyya, in apparent retaliation for expression critical of the university administration. Bhattacharyya is a professor of economics who has taught at VBU since 2001. He is also the president of the ...
On January 5 and 6, 2021, police reportedly detained 31 seventeen students in apparent retaliation for their participation in a protest at Boğaziçi University. On January 1, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appointed new rectors to five universities. These included appointing Melih ...
On January 4, 2021, police reportedly attacked students during a protest at the Boğaziçi University (BU) over the appointment of a new rector. On January 1, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appointed new rectors to five universities. These include appointing Melih Bulu, ...
On December 29, 2020, authorities reportedly detained Maati Monjib, a Moroccan professor of history, journalist and the head of the Ibn Rushd Institute for Investigative Journalism, which provides training to Moroccan journalists. The arrest was one of a string of ...
On December 29, 2020, police clashed with student protesters at the American University of Beirut (AUB), during a demonstration over the price of tuition. In the weeks leading up to the protest, authorities at AUB and the Lebanese American University, both ...
On December 19, 2020, security guards reportedly clashed with student protesters at the American University of Beirut (AUB). Dubbed “Student Rage Day,” the protests began in the city of Hamra in response to decisions by authorities at the AUB and Lebanese ...
On December 16, 2020, authorities reportedly fired tear gas at students protesting the sudden closure of Sa’adatu Rimi College of Education in Nigeria. On December 15, Nigeria’s Commissioner for Higher Education announced the closure of all higher education institutions in the ...
On December 16, 2020, Dr. Ahmed al-Sharifi, a professor at Al-Manara University College in the Iraqi city of Amara, was shot and killed by unidentified gunmen. The gunmen fled the scene, and a motive for the killing was not publicly reported. ...
On December 15, 2020, police arrested students and others during a nonviolent candlelight vigil that marked the first anniversary of a protest at Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) against a controversial law known as the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
On December 11, 2020, a group of unidentified individuals reportedly beat a student at the University of Edinburgh, in an apparently racially motivated attack. The student was eating dinner outside of the university library, where he works, when a group of ...