Around 6:30 a.m., the occupiers posted videos of the eviction in progress on their social networks. We see police officers, present in large numbers, urging the students towards the exit. The occupiers also called for mobilization to “come and support them”. “Repression will not stop us. You only make our movement and our determination grow,” underlined one of their communications.
“We can confirm that Building B, on the Solbosch campus, was evacuated this morning,” ULB said. Around 8:30 a.m., the premises had been completely evacuated. However, around forty students are mobilized in front of the building, and speak of a “violent expulsion”, according to a Belga journalist present on site. Around ten police officers are camped in front of the entrance to the building, and technicians barricade the windows.
“I woke up to the sound of doors being broken down. Some people were beaten and strangled by the police, and computers and phones were broken during the eviction. We were then all taken into the auditorium, where the police checked our identities,” testified a student. According to her, the occupants were not warned in advance of the evacuation.
According to the ULB, the students were not expelled by the police, but “left the premises voluntarily on the basis of the order served to them on Tuesday morning by a bailiff. He was accompanied by the police , present in the event of clashes, but fortunately she did not have to intervene.
Under the name of the “Popular University of Brussels”, the student occupation denounces the “genocide” underway in Gaza and urges the management of the ULB to “unequivocally sever all forms of collaboration with Zionist academic institutions and businesses who participate in the systematic oppression of the Palestinian people.
At the end of May, the university management announced that it would suspend any agreement or institutional research project involving an Israeli university, until “the clear commitment” of the universities concerned “in favor of the requirements issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). ) on May 24.
Last week, the rector Annemie Schaus called on the occupants to vacate the building as quickly as possible, believing that the evolution of the movement “no longer responds to the ideals which motivated it” and regretting in particular the “degradations committed” during of several actions. On Friday, however, the students announced the extension of their action, considering that their demands had not been fully met.
“Faced with their persistent refusals to leave the premises, we were forced to file a request with the Brussels Court of First Instance to put an end to this occupation, as required by law. An order authorizing the evacuation was issued and notified this morning to the occupants, giving them, once again, the opportunity to leave the premises voluntarily,” insisted the university management.
The ULB believes that during the seven weeks of occupation, “it tried, in vain, to establish a dialogue with the occupants, to listen to their demands – some of which were met”. However, she deplores that, despite her “efforts for a negotiated outcome, the situation has continued to deteriorate.”
