(Brussels Signal) Academics have called for the resignation of the president of France’s University of Lyon 2, Isabelle von Bueltzingsloewen, over her treatment of a professor targeted by “anti-racist and anti-colonial students.”
“Fabrice Balanche, a senior lecturer and recognised specialist in Syria and the geopolitical dynamics of the Middle East, has been the target of a violent smear campaign orchestrated by a group of students calling themselves anti-racist activists,” claimed the academics in an open letter published on April 18 by Le Figaro, signatories of which included former French education minister Jean-Michel Blanquer.
“Criticising him for his alleged support of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, as well as his allegedly ‘Islamophobic’ positions, these students demanded his eviction from the university, going so far as to publish defamatory visuals and disrupt his teaching,” they added.
