The Faculty of Science discourages its students and employees to travel to countries neighbouring Ukraine, even though countries such as Poland and Hungary are ‘safe’ countries, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. A matter of ‘common sense’, the dean finds.

The reason for the message, distributed via the faculty’s internal newsletter, was a study association’s planned trip to Poland. The faculty did not think it was wise to let the trip take place. Traveling to countries such as the Baltic States and Hungary is also discouraged.

‘You don’t even want to think about something happening to one of our people over there,’ dean Sijbrand de Jong adds. ‘Furthermore, there is a huge flood of refugees coming out of Ukraine right now. That puts an enormous pressure on infrastructure and facilities in countries such as Poland.’

According to De Jong, countries neighbouring Ukraine currently need their full capacities to help refugees, not to house students and scientists from Nijmegen. ‘That is just common sense,’ he says.

Own course

With this travel advice, the Faculty of Science runs its own course. The Executive Board tends to follow the advice of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In that advice, the Baltic States, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia are marked as safe countries; the safety risks there are comparable to those in the Netherlands, according to the ministry.

The Faculty of Science is free to advice its students and employees in its own way, says spokesman of the Executive Board Martijn Gerritsen. He does add that when it comes to travel advices, it would be best ‘for clarity’ if all faculties would follow the same guidebook.