The Vrije Universiteit Brussel (布鲁塞尔自由大学), or VUB, is a Dutch-speaking public research university in Brussels, Belgium. According to the university’s own account of its history, it traces its roots to the Free University of Brussels, founded in 1834 by lawyer Pierre-Théodore Verhaegen as a secular alternative to church-run higher education, which split along linguistic lines in 1969 into VUB and the French-speaking Université libre de Bruxelles. VUB became a fully independent institution in 1970. The university enrolls roughly 22,000 students across eight faculties and campuses in Etterbeek, Jette, Anderlecht, and Pajottegem. VUB previously hosted a Confucius Institute, a Chinese state-funded language and culture program, established in 2015 and shut down in 2019 after Belgian security services accused its director of working as a recruiter for Chinese intelligence.