Rector appalled by assault on campus
Last Friday night, 5 April 2024, a PhD-student was assaulted on campus. “The executive board of WUR is appalled by the attack”, says rector magnificus Carolien Kroeze, “There is no place for violence in Dutch society, in Wageningen and least of all on our campus. We want to be an open and safe space for everyone. The police has started an investigation. We are working closely with them and municipality to find the assailants. Please contact the police in case you were witness to this specific attack or other forms of harassment.”
Not the only incident
Following this incident, it has come to light that other incidents have taken place that have not been reported to WUR or the police. Please feel free to report incidents and harassments. It helps us and the authorities to estimate how big the problem is and where in Wageningen these incidents occur.
- For students, please follow the information on this page.
- For employees and PhD’s follow the information on the HR Service Portal.
In case of emergency, always call 112. In case of no emergency, the police can be reached at 0900-8844. Both call centers are open 24/7.
On social media, unfortunately, we find some misinformation about this case. The facts are as following:
Can I come to campus at night?
Yes. We want to be an open and safe space for everyone. Campus is publicly accessible terrain, owned by WUR, where police is responsible for public safety. In addition to that, WUR hires a security company to make sure visitors and buildings are safe. The coming weeks, additional security will be present.
On police / ambulance immediate response to the attack
The victims of the attack wisely called the Dutch alarm center 112. Police did come to the crime scene, but did not find the perpetrators. The ambulance also drove to the crime scene, but the victim was already being transported to the hospital at that time. So the ambulance returned to base.
On cooperation with the authorities
Our priority of course is to bring the perpetrators to justice. In order to do that, we need to follow strict procedures to make sure all evidence is handled according to Dutch laws and regulations. Please be sure we are doing what we can in collaboration with police and municipality to find the attackers. That includes sharing camera images with the police.
On WUR deleting messages on social media
Some people accuse WUR of deleting comments on social media. WUR almost never does that, unless the comments are hateful / racist. We suspect the algorithm of (in this case) Instagram to detect excessive engagements. In that case, Instagram might auto-block or restrict your commenting abilities. We unfortunately have no influence on this automated behavior.