Welcome to this latest edition of the European Group newsletter.  

In these turbulent times, we hope you are all doing as well as you can. In particular, we want to send solidarity to colleagues from universities in the United Kingdom who are experiencing widespread cuts, redundancies and closures. We also want to acknowledge the ongoing social movements across Europe, particularly in France, Spain, Portugal, Serbia and Georgia, where people are mobilising for better living conditions, access to education and housing, and democratic rights. We stand in solidarity with those facing repression and strongly condemn the disproportionate use of police force and restrictions on the right to protest, particularly in France, where recent student-led mobilisations have been met with thousands of arrests, the majority involving minors, and serious injuries caused by police weapons.

Thank you to all those who came to the 54th European Group Conference in Vitoria-Gasteiz!

In this edition you will find Andrea Beckman’s conference report on the British/Irish section of the European Group, as well as updates from some of the actions from the 54th Conference AGM. Other actions are still ongoing, and we will update you as working groups develop  work on the Conflict/Complaint Protocol and Electoral Procedures.

In addition, you will find critical work and comments shared by European Group members including Victoria Canning’s ‘Supporting Survival Toolkit’ for those working refugee survivors of torture, Paddy Hillyard’s comment on the Pat Finucane Inquiry, David Scott and Joanna Gilmore’s  International Expert Statement on the Chatterton Massacre  and Ignasi Bernat’s eyewitness report from the trial of Spanish police regarding their conduct in Catalonia during the independence referendum of 2017.

As ever, we include positive news of members’ PhD defences and publications – please remember to email any positive news you would like to share!

Finally, you will have all received an email inviting you to an Emergency General Meeting on Friday 13th November (hopefully it is not unlucky for us!) – we hope as many of you as possible will attend, as we will urgently discuss the 55th conference. Details and link are in the newsletter. 

In solidarity,

Aitor Jiménez González, Gillian McNaull, Javiera Farias, Shaïn Morisse

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