Academic Freedom | Response to UUK Regarding the Expert Statement by UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association

Vivienne Stern MBE

Chief Executive, Universities UK

cc. Professor Dame Sally Mapstone DBE, FRSE

President, Universities UK

cc. Jo Grady,

General Secretary, University and College Union

Sent via email: vivienne.stern@universitiesuk.ac.uk; principal@st-andrews.ac.uk; jgrady@ucu.org.uk

15 November 2024

Dear Ms Stern,

Thank you for your letter dated 28th October on behalf of Universities UK, yourself and Professor Mapstone, in response to our letter of 23rd October.

While we are pleased to hear of the steps that UUK has taken over the past year, and of your “steadfast” commitment to academic freedom and freedom of speech within the law, your letter did not address or respond to the main substance of our letter, which focused on the recent expert statement by United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association, Gina Romero. This report identifies systematic and concerted attacks, including by UK universities, on the student movement supporting Palestinian human rights, and outlines a series of recommendations for universities and other academic institutions.

We wrote to you asking that you join our call for UK universities to implement the Special Rapporteur’s recommendations immediately and in full. Because your letter did not address this important issue, we are writing again to kindly request that you respond on this point.

We hope that you will join our call, which would protect freedoms of expression, association, peaceful assembly and protest on university campuses. This would offer much-needed reassurance to our members that their rights will be respected, and that UK universities will remain places of open intellectual exchange.

We look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely,

Professor Nicola Pratt    

BRISMES President           

Dr Lewis Turner

Chair of BRISMES Committee on Academic Freedom 

On behalf of the Committee on Academic Freedom 

British Society for Middle Eastern Studies (BRISMES)