New Democracy party on Friday tabled an amendment that seeks the abolition of university asylum in its current form. The amendment was attached as a rider to a draft bill on setting up a fund for enterprise and development that will be debated in Parliament next Tuesday.
In its supporting report, ND noted that today, 29 years after it was first established, "university asylum constitutes a controversial institution with degenerative tendencies".
The party argued that the law no longer served its original purpose, which was to ensure academic freedoms, the free exchange of ideas and unobstructed education and research.
"Instead it creates an 'islet' that lends itself to committing all kinds of illegal actions and facilitates external interventions by all sorts from outside the universities," ND stated, pointing to the recent occupation of a Law School building by economic migrants and warning that university campuses might well become lawless enclaves where delinquent behaviours were protected.
Its proposed amendment would abolish articles governing university asylum in a 2007 law and replace these with articles that specifically protect academic research, freedom of expression and the right to teach different ideas and views.
The party has sought to differentiate its stance from that of the right-wing Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) party, which tabled draft legislation to fully abolish asylum in universities a day earlier. Despite a statement earlier this week from ND leader Antonis Samaras that asylum should be abolished, the party has toned down its final stance to one of modifying asylum laws as these exist today.
source: ana
