This Saturday, November 30, 2024, the cooperation agreement between the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) and Russia and Belarus will come to an end.
This decision was reported by Swissinfo.
The termination of cooperation is a response to Russia's military invasion of Ukraine.
Currently, approximately 350 scientists associated with Russian research institutes have previously collaborated with CERN, many of whom did not even reside in Geneva.
The decision of the CERN member countries to end cooperation with Moscow and Minsk will primarily affect collaboration with Russian scientific institutes. However, relationships with Russian scientists working under other agreements with CERN will continue.
It is worth noting that in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the 24 member countries of CERN decided in December 2023 to stop cooperation with Russian scientific institutes. This decision was announced in March and June 2022. CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire), which is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year, is the largest center for fundamental research in the field of elementary particle physics in the world.
It is located near Geneva, partly in Switzerland and partly in France. Research on the structure of matter is conducted here using the Large Hadron Collider. In addition, CERN is the birthplace of the internet (World Wide Web). The organization has approximately 3,000 employees, and its annual budget is 1.3 billion francs. Around 17,000 invited scientists from 110 countries participate in experiments at CERN, although most of them work in laboratories of other institutions and countries.
As noted by CERN, the absence of scientists from Russia will be noticeable, but CERN will be able to compensate for this loss. Moreover, Russia has never been a full member of CERN and held only the status of an observer state, meaning it did not contribute to the annual budget or have voting rights. The number of scientists from Belarus has traditionally been small as well.
