Taiwan-based colleges and universities are not permitted to engage in activities with Chinese individuals, groups or agencies outside the confines of the law, Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) said on Tuesday.
The Ministry of Education has warned tertiary institutions that any exchanges with China that are non-academic are unlawful, Pan told a legislative hearing in Taipei, citing the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例).
The ministry has sent a notice to all colleges and universities in Taiwan, informing them that “any cooperation with China’s political parties, government or military agencies is unlawful,” Pan said, adding that an investigation into such contacts would be launched.
Pan was responding to questions from legislators after the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) on Monday reported that the Cross-Strait Tsinghua
Research Institute (清華海峽研究院) had established an office at National Tsing Hua University’s (NTHU) main campus in Hsinchu City without securing approval from the government.
In its notice, the ministry said that all cross-strait educational exchanges must be made in compliance with the law, including the employment of teaching personnel, to prevent any recurrence of such activities.
Academic exchanges “between the two sides must be held on an ‘equal and mutually-beneficial’ basis,” the notice said. “All on-campus activities, including the use of facilities and rented spaces, must be in line with Article 33-1 of the act.”
Without government approval, universities are not allowed to engage in cooperation with individuals; institutions; political, military or administrative agencies in China; or any political propaganda groups in that country, the ministry said.
Extralegal exchanges might compromise Taiwan’s interests and national security, the ministry added.
On Monday, the institute office at NTHU was ordered to close and its personnel sent to China.
The institute was founded in Xiamen, China, in 2015 by NTHU’s alumni association, Beijing-based Tsinghua University and the Xiamen City Government.
In a statement on Monday, NTHU said that the institute was partly founded by several NTHU alumni, but has no direct relationship with the university itself.
The institute rented an office on NTHU’s campus via the Tze-Chiang Foundation of Science and Technology, an organization founded by NTHU alumni, the university said.
On Tuesday, NTHU reiterated that it was not involved in the operations of the institute, after then-NTHU president Wu Cheng-wen (吳誠文) was found to have attended the institute’s opening ceremony in April 2016.
The university said that Wu did attend the event, but was not part of the institute’s operations.
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