How did people across Central and Eastern Europe imagine the future during the transitions of the 1980s and 1990s? The umbrella term ‘post-communism’ does not provide an answer to this question. This project explores how writers and cultural theorists saw the potential future of their societies during…

On Wednesday 4 December the vice-rector of the Sholokhov Moscow State University for the Humanities and the director of its Russian Institute of Advanced Studies visited Leiden University. The delegation signed a Memorandum of Understanding with dean Wim van den Doel to further collaboration in the…

The Georgian Minister of Foreign Affairs Maia Panjikidze will be paying a lightning visit to Leiden University on 26 March. She will give a lecture and take part in a debate on the theme of 'European perspective – The Georgian case'. All are welcome.

The Academic Language Centre is organising an introduction to Ukrainian with the Russian Studies/Russian and Eurasian Studies programmes. This six-part course is meant primarily for people who are in contact with refugees from Ukraine.

Ukraine has filed an innovative claim against Russia at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Ukraine asked the court to rule that it has not committed genocide and that a war initiated based on a false genocide claim was unlawful. Larissa van den Herik, Professor of Public International Law, discussed…

The Humanities Faculty Teaching Award has been won by Olja Karmanova. The Russian lecturer was presented with the award during the opening of the faculty year.

Peter Rodrigues, Professor Emeritus of Immigration and board member of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights, recently dealt with a fascinating case in which a woman with Russian nationality felt she had suffered discrimination.

Suddenly there they were, the Russian soldiers near the border of Ukraine. Since then, reports of tensions between Russia on the one hand and the United States and Europe on the other have dominated the news. What is going on? An interview with Russia expert André Gerrits.

The thermostat in Leiden University’s buildings will be turned down by two degrees. The temperature will also be adjusted in rooms that are cooled. This is the University’s response to the government’s call to use less energy.

On the 15th of March, the radio program “The World of BNR Nieuwsradio” was live broadcasted from the Spanish Steps at the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs in The Hague. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, associated with the Institute of Security and Global Affairs, was one of the radio show’s guests. Following…

President Zelensky of Ukraine has asked the UN International Court of Justice to issue an urgent order to stop Russian military activity in his country. According to Zelensky, Russia has twisted the concept of genocide to justify aggression.

Paolo Sartori is a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Iranian Studies of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna. In Leiden he will deliver one guest lecture on Twilight of the Persianate: The Vernacularization of Central Asia (18th - early 20th Centuries) on 12 April and a masterclass on How can we…

Beatrice Penati is Assistant Professor of History at Nazarbayev University (Astana, Kazakhstan). Dr Penati will deliver a guest lecture on Monday, 10 October and a masterclass on Thursday, 13 October within the Central Asia Initiative at Leiden University.

Everyone has been watching the attack on Ukraine, a war on the European continent, with a sense of foreboding. It will bring devastation, loss, suffering and worry and it raises questions. With these words, Rector Magnificus Hester Bijl opened the meeting on the war in Ukraine at Wijnhaven on Thursday…

On March 16th, students from all over the world visited Leiden's Humanities Faculty to explore their options during the Master's Open Day. 'Leiden is a beautiful city, I feel like I could definitely study here.'

Six programmes in the Faculty of Humanities have been awarded the designation 'top programme' by the Keuzegids. These are the bachelor’s in German Language and Culture, Greek and Latin Language and Culture, Latin American Studies, Ancient Near East Studies, Religious Studies and Russian Studies.

Samen met andere studenten bracht Fien Lurvink hulpgoederen naar Oekraïne en nam vluchtelingen mee terug.

The war in Ukraine has lasted almost two weeks now. What does Putin expect to achieve with his invasion and how big is the chance that the West will get involved? We phoned André Gerrits, professor and expert on Russia.

During her work for the European Union, Sophie Vériter witnessed how young people in countries like Ukraine and Moldova were exposed to Russian propaganda. After mapping out the EU’s disinformation policy, the PhD candidate now advocates for a revised approach.

Russia is required to pay billions of dollars to shareholders of Russian oil company Yukos. This was decided by the appeals court in The Hague.

The Russian military assault on Ukraine has profoundly shocked knowledge institutions in the Netherlands, as represented by Universities of the Netherlands, the Netherlands Association of Universities of Applied Sciences, the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Dutch Research Council,…

The Leiden bachelor’s programmes in Linguistics, Religious Studies and Ancient Near Eastern Studies have received the accolade of ‘top study programme’ in the Keuzegids (Study Guide) 2019 for Universities.

Bart Schuurman sheds light on the alarming trend in both the frequence and geographical spread of these incidents with The Parliament Magazine.

Anneleen van der Meer discusses Russia's alleged use of chemical weapons in Ukraine in an article for The Conversation.

The association agreement between the EU and Ukraine is highly important for peace in Ukraine, and it is therefore essential that Europe weathers these difficult times. These were the words of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on 27 November during his Europe Lecture at Leiden University.

The war between Ukraine and Russia is playing out not just on the battlefield but also on the geopolitical playing field of gas. Conflicts at the start of this century about this energy source were, says PhD candidate Ilia Barboutev, a precursor to today’s war.

The Business, Technology & Public Policy research group of the Department of Business Sciences at Leiden University focuses on investigating the dynamic interaction between 'new' technologies and various stakeholders, including consumers, employees, and businesses. Our research delves into perceptions,…

Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL) is an independent institute within the Leiden University Humanities Faculty. A Management Team, consisting of an Academic Director, a Director of Education and an Institute Manager, is responsible for the overall running of the institute. This team is…

First set up in 2015, the Language Learner Corpus (LLC) project collected language data of over 150 language students. We have now launched new communicative tasks to collect longitudinal data of language learners at Leiden University.

Ben de Jong and Paul Abels, both working for ISGA, discuss the Russian claim that espionage equipment was found in Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad (AD). According to the Russians the equipment was found in one of the cars used by their diplomats in The Hague.

As of 1 September , Karel Berkhoff has been appointed professor by special appointment in Ukrainian History. In this position, made possible in part by the KNAW, he will focus primarily on dark moments in recent Ukrainian history: the persecutions that have taken place in the first half of the twentieth…

For the Dutch Safety Board (DSB), the investigation into the MH17 plane crash was unprecedented in scope. It wasn’t easy, but it provided valuable lessons for international disaster investigations, says Sanneke Kuipers, a crisis expert from the Institute of Security and Global Affairs.

On Friday 15 March, more than 750 students from the Netherlands and abroad visited the Master’s Open Day at the Faculty of Humanities to explore their options.

Wereldwijd worden veel samenwerkingsverbanden met Rusland stopgezet vanwege de oorlog in Oekraïne. Hoe zit dat met de ruimtevaart, waar de Russen ook een groot aandeel in hebben?

Eva Michaels talks about the current international security environment, including intelligence issues with Sir John Sawers in an interview in El País.

Emma de Vries, PhD candidate in the Department of European Law at Leiden University, has written an annotation for EHRC updates on the ECHR judgment in Suprun and Others v. Russia (June 18, 2024, case number 58029/12).

Missiles that travel at approximately six thousand kilometres per hour, up to 5 or 6 times the speed of sound. Has Russia used those against Ukraine and how is that possible? In Leiden University’s Dutch video series ‘De Werkplaats’, Danny Pronk, political scientist, security expert, and researcher…

The GDPR privacy legislation is no impediment to handing out sanctions to Russian oligarchs or reuniting children placed in care with their parents, says privacy experts Anna Berlee, Marlies van Eck, Simone van der Hof, Simone Huting, Friederike van der Jagt and Jeroen Terstegge.

Quasicrystals are crystals with ‘impossible’ five-fold symmetries, which nevertheless were synthesized in the lab in 1982. Paul J. Steinhardt helped figure out their structure, but he didn’t stop at that.

On 12 September 2018 Rijpma, Associate Professor of European Law at the Europa Institute, spoke at the Netherlands Institute in St. Petersburg in the framework of the Dutch Wednesday lecture series.

Assistant Professor of European Studies and International Relations Daniel Schade was a guest on Deutschland Heute on Deutschlandfunk and spoke about the recent Schengen evaluation report by the European Commission.

After a year of war against Ukraine, professors André Gerrits, Antoaneta Dimitrova and Frans Osinga look back at Russian aggression and Western unity and ahead to the new offensive.

What does life look like after International Studies? For Chris Colijn who graduated in 2018, it involves working on his master’s in Russian and Eurasian Studies, in combination with a bustling traineeship for “Raam of Rusland”, a think tank, focusing on Russian and Ukrainian politics, economy and culture.…

Svetlana Gorshenina, Associate Lecturer at Collège de France, Paris, will be the Central Asia Visiting Scholar from 17 February until 25 February 2018. Svetlana Gorshenina will deliver a guest lecture on Tuesday, 20 February and a masterclass on Friday, 23 February within the Central Asia Initiative…

Ukrainian Yana Rudenko lived through the Russian occupation of Bucha in March 2022 and thereafter came to Leiden to study. thereafter De Oekraïense Yana Rudenko (24) jaar heeft in maart 2022 de Russische bezetting van Boetsja meegemaakt en is daarna gaan studeren in Leiden.

Professor Jos Schaeken has been appointed interim vice-dean from 1 March. As Mirjam de Baar's successor, he will focus on future-proofing the education portfolio, particularly the master's programmes.