The publication by Anne Kostrzewa highlighted initiatives and cooperation realized recently at the Institute for East European Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, aimed on the support for Ukraine:
- A bridging scholarship from the Institute for East European Studies (OEI) at the Freie Universität Berlin is intended to help researchers at risk from Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus by offering them three to six months support to develop and submit applications for extramural funding or to apply for other scholarships or fellowships. Freie Universität Berlin launched the call for the scholarship on March 18, 2022. So far, 15 fellowships have been awarded.
- Relations with academic institutions in Russia suspended.
- Together with historians from the Leibniz Centre for Contemporary History (Leibniz-Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam e. V., ZZF), teachers from the Institute for East European Studies have visited more than 60 school classes in Berlin and Brandenburg to talk with young people from seventh grade on about the Soviet Union and East-Central Europe after the Iron Curtain, providing them with historical background about the current war. They also hold training sessions for high school teachers.
- Freie Universität Berlin also maintains close partnerships with Ukraine. In September 2021, a two-day conference “Days of Ukraine in Berlin and Brandenburg” took place in Dahlem, organised in cooperation with DUAG: report and video-recordings. It marked the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Institute for East European Studies and the 30th year of Ukraine’s independence. Researchers from Berlin, Brandenburg, and Ukraine were able to meet and further extend their collaboration.
The article originally appeared in German on May 8, 2022, in the Tagesspiegel newspaper supplement published by Freie Universität Berlin.