How Trump admin links Harvard to Chinese military

Economic Times

23-05-2025

Harvard's alleged ties with Chinese paramilitary
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Alleged Harvard collaboration with Chinese researchers funded by Iran
Harvard researchers' alleged link with Chinese military
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By barring Harvard University from taking international students, the Trump administration has escalated its campaign against several prominent American universities. The move came after Harvard refused to provide information that the government demanded about some foreign student visa holders at Harvard. The university said the move by the Trump administration - which affects thousands of students - was illegal and amounted to retaliation. The Trump administration accuses Harvard of not cooperating with government inquiries and fostering a campus environment hostile to Jewish students, supporting pro-Hamas sentiment and promoting discriminatory race-based diversity policies.Another shocking charge is Harvard's link to a banned entity linked to the Chinese paramilitary, though Chinese infiltration of American campuses has been widely reported for nearly a decade and often drawn attention of the US government. The Trump administration has accused the university of "coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party".The House Select Committee on China, joined by the House Committee on Education and Workforce and Chairwoman of House Republican Leadership Elise Stefanik, sent a letter to Harvard University a few days ago demanding transparency and accountability regarding the university's partnerships with foreign adversaries and entities implicated in human rights abuses.A House Select Committee is a special sub-committee formed by the United States House of Representatives to investigate specific issues or problems.The letter requested internal documents and communications from Harvard officials detailing the university's partnerships with foreign adversaries. It outlines troubling partnerships and activities that raise serious national security and ethical concerns, as per a release by the committee."On multiple occasions, Harvard hosted and trained members of the sanctioned, paramilitary organization XPCC—one of the primary implementers of the CCP's genocide against the Uyghur people," the letter claims. "As you know, the PRC has arbitrarily detained as many as 1.8 million Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and members of other Muslim minority groups in a system of extrajudicial mass internment camps, and XPCC operates at the forefront of the CCP's genocide against the Uyghur people. Harvard provided services to XPCC on multiple occasions after the U.S. Treasury Department listed XPCC on the SDN List in 2020. Treasury's sanctions generally prohibit U.S. persons from contributing or providing any funds, goods, or services by, to, or for the benefit of a designated party as well as the receipt of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services from any designated party." The letter says XPCC has used the fig leaf of health care-related efforts to whitewash the CCP's crimes in Xinjiang.The letter also accuses Harvard of mentioning its link to the banned entity in a document but later deleting that reference. "In November 2019, Harvard hosted a training course on health finance in collaboration with the Chinese government, and Harvard's press release at the time specifically touted XPCC's participation (though Harvard appears to have later removed this reference)," claims the letter.The letter says Harvard collaborated with the banned Chinese entity even after significant public reporting about mass detentions, relentless surveillance and gross human rights abuses against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. Even after the said Chinese entity was sanctioned by the US government, Harvard continued to provide services to it for years, claims the letter.Referring to an event organised in 2023, the letter accuses Harvard of trying to hide its link to the banned Chinese entity. "Notably, Harvard opted to omit XPCC from its press release while the Chinese government's press statement for the same event highlighted XPCC's participation. Additionally, Harvard's press release shows blurred name plates for four of five panelists, which raises questions about why Harvard wanted to keep their identities hidden," the letter claims.The letter by the House Select Committee on China also alleged Harvard's link with the Iran government. "Harvard researchers have also worked with PRC-based collaborators on projects funded by an Iranian government agent," the letter claims. "One Harvard researcher conducted scientific research with researchers from a PRC defense-linked university funded through a grant from this Iranian government agent. This research paper was written in partnership with a professor at Zhejiang University , a Chinese university that hosts multiple Chinese defense laboratories and cooperates closely with China's military. The research received funding from a grant from the Iranian National Science Foundation.""This is not an isolated incident," the letter claims. "Harvard researchers worked on multiple projects across multiple years, all funded in part by the Iranian National Sciences Foundation. We identified at least four such projects since 2020, and one as recent as 2024. As you may know, under the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations, the Office of Foreign Assets Control has specifically disallowed transactions... when they involve the Iranian government and its instrumentalities. This funding from an Iranian government agent raises serious concerns and may violate U.S. law."The letter also claims that Harvard researchers worked with researchers at Chinese military linked institutions on US projects funded by the US Department of Defence."For example, Harvard researchers worked with faculty associated with Tsinghua University on research funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) that explored zero-indexed materials, which has optic-chip applications, a technology that could substantially improve artificial intelligence capabilities," the letter claims. "In another example, a Harvard researcher worked with a professor associated with Zhejiang University on a paper researching polymer science funded by the U.S. Air Force, among others. This polymer research holds potential applications in areas such as aircraft construction. In yet a third instance, a Harvard researcher worked with academics associated with the Huazhong University of Science and Technology (Huazhong University) on research funded by the U.S. Air Force that explores materials such as shape memory alloys. Shape metal alloys were noted to have aerospace applications. All three institutions are publicly linked to China's military.""Tsinghua University, General Secretary Xi Jinping's alma mater, conducts defense research for the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and has been implicated in cyber-attacks against the United States. Zhejiang University hosts multiple Chinese defense laboratories and is linked to economic and cyber espionage. Huazhong University hosts a significant number of PLA-linked defense laboratories and has close links to China's defense industry," the letter says.The letter also claimed that Harvard researchers routinely worked with Chinese military-linked institutions on research that can advance China's military capabilities.