Ten students of St. Petersburg University will be expelled for “irony” in connection with the death of a sophomore in the war

St. Petersburg State University (SPbSU) expelled ten students for “wrong attitude” to the death of a second-year student in the war with Ukraine. This decision was made by the university’s ethics committee.

Fyodor Solomonov, a second-year student at the Historical Institute of St. Petersburg University, is said to have volunteered for the war in Ukraine last fall and was killed on April 1, 2023. Ten students, nine of whom are studying “History” and one is studying “Conflictology”, “instead of honoring the memory of a peer and showing normal human feelings”, began to “mock what happened, defame the student’s memory.”

The students also committed “other activities aimed at discrediting the conduct of a special military operation by the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation” – the university noted.

From 3 to 5 June, the commission issued 11 decisions in this case in relation to students from the 1st to the 4th year. In 10 cases, it found that students violated the university’s code of ethics, in another – that there was no violation. Every decision has the same text.

In all cases, the committee’s response to the complaint reported that the students had not made “convincing objections” and that “the ethics committee had no confidence in the position expressed by the students.” In relation to each student, it was decided that his actions were “incompatible with the status of a student of St. Petersburg State University.”

Earlier, Mikhail Belousov, an associate professor at the Institute of History, was expelled from St. Petersburg University for anti-war statements. The decision of Rector Nikolai Kropaczov to dismiss him was also preceded by the conclusions of the ethics committee.

Discussing the death of student Solomonov, Belousov wrote in a chat that “direct and open consent to slander is disgusting.” The correspondence was published on pro-government telegram channels, after which a protocol was drawn up against the teacher for “discrediting” the army, which stated that “he expressed his opinion to students about the participation of the Russian Armed Forces in the war, and not in a special military operation.” However, after his dismissal from St. Petersburg State University, the case against Belousov was dropped.