China plans to order most foreign students to leave Beijing before the Olympic Games in August, strictly regulate the issuing of business and tourist visas, and deport refugees, sources said yesterday.
“Even if you have to continue your studies in September, you need to leave Beijing in July and August,” a spokeswoman for Beijing University said.
The university is one of China’s most prestigious colleges and enrolls hundreds of foreign students annually on Chinese-language and other courses.
The spokeswoman from Beijing University’s international cooperation department said the two-month gap applies to all universities in Beijing and was ordered by “higher authorities” because of the Olympics.
She said all short-term summer courses for foreigners had been canceled this year.
One Western education official estimated that at least 10,000 students could be affected by the order if it applied to the whole country, though some universities outside Beijing said they were unaware of the rule.
The head of the German academic exchange, the DAAD, said a ban on foreign students during the Olympics was not mentioned in recent meetings with officials.
An administrator of dormitories for foreigners at Tongji University in Shanghai said her department had received no notice banning students during the Olympics.
But a woman who assists foreign students in China said at least two universities outside Beijing, Anhui Normal University and Heilongjiang University, had stopped recruiting foreign students for courses running beyond July.
She said she believed any students with visas until the end of this year would be allowed to stay in Beijing, but she added that most student visas would expire in June before the universities’ normal summer vacation.
A foreign ministry official said he was unaware of any ban on students but the normal education of foreign students “will be guaranteed.”
The official China Daily said about 190,000 foreign students from 188 nations attended courses in China last year.
Asked for comment last night, Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council Vice Chairman Liu Teh-hsun (劉德勳) said he was unaware of the developments, but that the council would monitor the situation.
China has already severely restricted the issuing of short-term and multi-entry business visas, prompting complaints from business groups and diplomats.
Some Beijing-based businesses said they may be unable to fill vacancies until after the Olympics because of the new restrictions.
“You can be sure that all countries affected will raise the issue with the Chinese side very intensively,” one informed source said of the restrictions on business visas.
“It clearly has to do with the Olympics,” the source said.
China appears to have acted partly in response to recent reports that police uncovered at least two terrorist plots targeting the Olympics, the source said, adding that other nations had taken similar security measures in the past.
China’s Foreign Ministry yesterday defended the move and said visas were issued “according to law.”
“I believe it will have no influence on normal business activities in China,” ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu (姜瑜) said.
But Joerg Wuttke, president of the EU Chamber of Commerce in China, yesterday criticized China for limiting business visas issued in Hong Kong.
Wuttke called the restrictions “truly annoying” and charged that the new visa rules were unclear and had never been published.
The new measures, which an informed source said were temporary, require non-permanent Hong Kong residents to apply for visas in their home countries.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) also said it was concerned about the deportation of vulnerable refugees from China before the Olympics.
In a statement posted on its Web site, UNHCR highlighted the case of a 17-year-old unaccompanied refugee who was returned to his country of origin after being taken from his home in Beijing on April 3.
UNHCR spokeswoman Jennifer Pagonis said that some of the deportations among the 180 refugees recorded by UNHCR in China “may well constitute a violation” of the 1951 Refugee Convention.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
US PUBLICATION: The results indicated a change in attitude after a 2023 survey showed 55 percent supported full-scale war to achieve unification, the report said More than half of Chinese were against the use of force to unify with Taiwan under any circumstances, a survey conducted by the Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center and Emory University found. The survey results, which were released on Wednesday in a report titled “Sovereignty, Security, & US-China Relations: Chinese Public Opinion,” showed that 55.1 percent of respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that “the Taiwan problem should not be resolved using force under any circumstances,” while 24.5 percent “strongly” or “somewhat” disagreed with the statement. The results indicated a change in attitude after a survey published in “Assessing Public Support for (Non)Peaceful Unification
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
The China Coast Guard has seized control of a disputed reef near a major Philippine military outpost in the South China Sea, Beijing’s state media said, adding to longstanding territorial tensions with Manila. Beijing claims sovereignty over almost all of the South China Sea and has waved away competing assertions from other countries as well as an international ruling that its position has no legal basis. China and the Philippines have engaged in months of confrontations in the contested waters, and Manila is taking part in sweeping joint military drills with the US which Beijing has slammed as destabilizing. The Chinese coast guard
RSS