Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Photo credit: Tufts Now On March 31, 2026, the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation declared Tufts University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy “undesirable organizations” imposing punishments ranging from fines to prison sentences on Russian citizens that are affiliated with the university or otherwise cooperate or interact with it. According to The Tufts Daily , the reason the office of the prosecutor...

Destroyed equipment and buildings in Iran's Sharif University by US-Israeli attacks on April 6, 2026. Photo credit: The New York Times . In Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon, as well as in the US-Israeli war against Iran, Lebanese and Iranian universities have been turned into military targets, not only endangering civilian lives and significantly disrupting educational activities in the region but also setting a very dangerous precedent for future military conflict. Two academics at...

Columbia University faculty protesting against the settlement between their university and the government, as a violation of institutional autonomy, on March 24, 2025. Photo credit: The New York Times . The 2026 update of the Academic Freedom Index (AFI) was published on March 17, 2026. Based on a dataset that measures academic freedom levels across 179 countries, the most recent iteration of the yearly report demonstrated once again the growing scale and intensity of attacks on academic...