As part of a comprehensive program to support refugee and at-risk students and scholars, Freie Universität launched a short-term scholarship program in 2022 to support 75 at-risk scholars from Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, and Iran. For this purpose, the international office initially doubled the guest invitation funds for the departments and opened up the possibility for financing short-term fellowships from these funds. Half of the scholarships were awarded to people who were still in Ukraine.

In 2023, the international office will make guest invitation funds available again to the departments to finance bridge fellowships for at-risk researchers and students. The departments themselves nominate persons to be sponsored, thus, please refrain from submitting external applications directly to the international office.