Escaping Oppression: Vasil Navumau on Belarus, Living in Exile, and Academic Freedom

Show notes

When activists in Belarus faced increasing repression in 2020 and a citizens‘ initiative he was involved in had to be shut down, sociologist Dr. Vasil Navumau had to leave the country to avoid imprisonment. With the support of the Philipp Schwatz Initiative, he came to Ruhr University Bochum in 2021. In this interview, conducted by Mareike Ilsemann, he talks about the 2020 protests, his journey to Germany and life as a scientist in exile.

Further information on “Fragile Freedom”: https://fragile-freiheit.de/en/

The project is being carried out by the science communication agency con gressa in cooperation with the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research as part of the “Science Year 2024 – Freedom”.

Additional resources and information on academic freedom:

Scholars at Risk, Free to Think 2023 – Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project : https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/resources/free-to-think-2023/ Friedrich-Alexander-Universität, Academic Freedom Index: https://academic-freedom-index.net/