Chinese state media and researchers have lashed out at a prominent US cancer centre’s decision to oust three scientists over alleged links to espionage, saying such moves would backfire on America.
Peter Pisters, president of the, told the The Houston Chronicle on Friday that the National Institutes of Health last year sent it details of conflicts of interest and unreported foreign income by five faculty members, giving the centre 30 days to respond.
After an internal investigation by the centre based in Houston, Texas, two of the scientists resigned ahead of termination proceedings, while the third is challenging the dismissal, according to the newspaper. All of the ousted scientists are Chinese but they have not been identified.
Pisters said the centre had an obligation to ensure US taxpayers’ money invested in biomedical research – it received US$148 million in public grants last year – was not used to benefit other countries.
But in China, the decision has been seen as a reckless act triggered by insecurity. An editorial in state-run tabloid Global Times on Saturday said the cancer centre’s move, along with Washington barring Chinese researchers from going to the US, was fresh evidence America is trying to cut its links with China.
“How could Washington think that it can stop China’s scientific progress by preventing Chinese from attending seminars in the US and recruiting fewer Chinese students at its science and engineering colleges?” the editorial said.
“This is a move by US policymakers to bring comfort – these measures are like a sleeping pill to help them through a restless night.”
The editorial also said China could retaliate against the US “in a necessary way” but that Beijing should not escalate the situation to a strategic “new cold war” level.
“If the US tries to block China-US academic exchanges, it is only giving the opportunity for these academic exchanges to other developed countries, and this will only make the US more isolated,” it said.
Jia Qingguo, head of international relations at Peking University, said expelling Chinese researchers was a short-sighted policy that would ultimately do more harm than good for the US.
“It shows that the US is less and less confident. The US has been a global leader in science and technology because it has attracted the greatest minds from across the world to work there,” he said. “It is losing a lot of talent and resources through what it’s doing now, and that’s not only hurting individual scientists, but also its own future as a scientific power.”
The Chinese government has not responded to the MD Anderson Cancer Centre decision.
Although Beijing and Washington are expected to reach a trade deal to end a protracted tariff battle in the coming weeks, there is no sign of mutual distrust easing between the world’s two largest economies.
While the US has cancelled visas for Chinese academics, White House adviser could not take part in a forum in Beijing on April 14 because his visa was not granted in time.
The cancer centre dismissals come amid a broader campaign targeting Chinese scientists in US agencies amid suspicions over Chinese efforts to steal American technology.
Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, told Science magazine last week that an investigation had been launched into NIH-funded foreign scientists at more than 55 American institutions, and that anyone found to be involved in theft of US research results would be fired and punished.
The cancer centre’s decision also drew a strong reaction from US-based pro-Beijing group the Chinese American Federation on Sunday. In a statement on social network WeChat, the group urged the US government and people to protect academic freedom and scientific communication, saying many Chinese researchers had recently been forced to give up or change their studies because of general distrust.
It added that suspicions over researchers stealing technology for the Chinese government or companies lacked factual evidence and were “inconsistent with American traditions and values”.
A prominent cancer center in Houston has ousted three of five scientists whom federal authorities identified as being involved in Chinese efforts to steal American research.
Peter Pisters, the president of MD Anderson Cancer Center, told the Houston Chronicle that the National Institutes of Health wrote to the cancer center last year detailing conflicts of interest and unreported foreign income by five faculty members, and gave it 30 days to respond.
“As stewards of taxpayer dollars invested in biomedical research, we have an obligation to follow up,” Pisters said. MD Anderson received $148 million in NIH grants last year.
The center provided internal documents to the Chronicle regarding the cases but the names of the scientists were redacted. The newspaper said all three are ethnically Chinese. Two of them resigned ahead of termination proceedings and the third is challenging the dismissal.
Officials determined termination was not warranted for one of the remaining two and are still investigating the other.
It’s not clear if any of them face federal charges or deportation. An FBI spokeswoman in Houston, Christina Garza, said Saturday that the agency “does not confirm or deny the existence of any investigation.”
Pisters said MD Anderson’s reputation as the world’s No. 1 cancer center made it an obvious target, but the newspaper report doesn’t say what evidence of intellectual property theft was uncovered at the facility.
The dismissals come amid heightened concern in Washington that foreign governments — including China — have been using students and visiting scholars to pilfer intellectual property from confidential grant applications.
At a gathering in Houston last summer, FBI officials warned Texas academic and medical institutions of the threat, particularly from insiders, and called on them to notify the agency of any suspicious behavior.
A 2017 FBI report found that intellectual-property theft by China costs the U.S. as much as $600 billion annually. FBI Director Christopher Wray has called China “the broadest, most significant” threat to the nation and that its espionage is active in all 50 states.
“This is part of a much larger issue the country is facing,” Pisters told the Chronicle. “Trying to balance an open collaborative environment and at the same time protect proprietary information and commercial interests.”
Some Chinese-Americans say the crackdown amounts to racial profiling and that it hinders groundbreaking research.
“Scientific research depends on the free flow of ideas,” Frank H. Wu, president of the New York-based Committee of 100, a group of influential Chinese-Americans, told the newspaper. “Our national interest is best advanced by welcoming people, not by racial stereotyping based on where a person comes from.”
related to the article right above is
Texas cancer center ousts three over Chinese data theft concerns
Well, those situations are completely different. Primarily, anyone stealing tech from J-20 has no other intention than to harm China's national security. But cancer research? Any results would benefit the world with no losers. National security is not in question here. It's not clear what happened, whether these scientists actually "stole" data for some financial purpose or were involved in some kind of cooperation with China that the US, out of paranoia, deemed "theft." When it comes to medical research, the US and China have enjoyed a very complementary relationship, that is, the US has traditionally held the lead in most areas of biomedical research but when it needs to test cohorts, it finds that China provides the largest population of patients to select from with very easy-to-work-with laws.Here's a perfect example of a double standard, so what would the Chinese do if an American Engineer or even a Chinese Engineer, working for Chengdu Aircraft were found to have stolen tech related to the J-20??
of course this all hypothetical, the MD Anderson cases are individuals who have engaged in "trafficking" intellectual property, they are fired and punished...
not beaten, interrogated, beaten some more, and then taken out and shot somewhere, I can guarantee you, if the situation were reversed?? they wouldn 't just be dismissed and sent home??? now would they??? it would be nice if someone would tell the truth about these types of situations, spying carries very severe penalties everywhere,,, but I would guess the US is far more civil than our two main competitors...????
Here's a perfect example of a double standard, so what would the Chinese do if an American Engineer or even a Chinese Engineer, working for Chengdu Aircraft were found to have stolen tech related to the J-20??
of course this all hypothetical, the MD Anderson cases are individuals who have engaged in "trafficking" intellectual property, they are fired and punished...
not beaten, interrogated, beaten some more, and then taken out and shot somewhere, I can guarantee you, if the situation were reversed?? they wouldn 't just be dismissed and sent home??? now would they??? it would be nice if someone would tell the truth about these types of situations, spying carries very severe penalties everywhere,,, but I would guess the US is far more civil than our two main competitors...????
Well, those situations are completely different. Primarily, anyone stealing tech from J-20 has no other intention than to harm China's national security. But cancer research? Any results would benefit the world with no losers. National security is not in question here. It's not clear what happened, whether these scientists actually "stole" data for some financial purpose or were involved in some kind of cooperation with China that the US, out of paranoia, deemed "theft." When it comes to medical research, the US and China have enjoyed a very complementary relationship, that is, the US has traditionally held the lead in most areas of biomedical research but when it needs to test cohorts, it finds that China provides the largest population of patients to select from with very easy-to-work-with laws.
Civility is not in question when you are comparing a national security case to cancer research cooperation. If scientists in the "civilized" USA were caught taking F-35 data to China, they wouldn't be fired and sent home either, would they? With the current atmosphere, if the penalties are low, rest assured, it's because the laws could not impose anything harsher and it was likely a legitimate cooperation with some deficiency in paperwork. It might also be a power struggle of who gets his name higher up on the list of the results to be presented and used by the world.
The impact that people are talking about is that on a more immediate base, research culture is based on sharing results with many people so everyone in the world can cooperate to snuff out a common problem like cancer. When a country like the US becomes paranoid and starts passing laws to limit what it shares and what its scientists can do, it stifles the ease of business in regards to research and imposes a penalty on the scientists in that country. Scientists in other countries have less paperwork and less restrictions when cooperating internationally and are thus more likely to get results. Soon, this will make scientists in the paranoid country want to go elsewhere because it's much easier to work and cooperate there. If these scientists are Chinese and feel increasingly mired down in the US and put under a hostile microscope for everything, that makes them far more likely to move to China, contributing to American brain drain.
On a more general sense, American society is based on the idea that once someone comes to America, s/he is American with an American home team and not a XXXese living in America with an American passport. Indeed, America relies on immigrants making contributions to the US, calling themselves American and America their home. To racially profile people is to unravel the very fibers that hold together American ideals and society; it is suicidal yet ironically instinctive for America to start profiling its citizens when it comes under challenge from a country that they originated from. Doing this pushes American culture from "we are all American" to "we are XXX living in America" and that makes more and more people (specifically Chinese in this case) realize that they are not American but rather being milked by Americans to raise America up over their own countries baited by a US passport. In the long run, it weakens American social structure, causing and accelerating American decay.
Let's try to be concise, leave out the pork farming and "God" in a discussion about medical technology, eh?Yet people did steal F-35 secrets didn't they?? they're not dead or beaten to death?? are they???
I get your whole point, and I agree with 99% of what you are saying, my Brother's DR. at MD Anderson is Chinese, to be honest my brother really didn't feel the typical connection??? in fact to quote my Brother?? he imagined he thought?? "the dumb sum-bitch is gonna die anyway"??? so why get too excited???
My Brother has hosted Chinese Pork Producer's at many of the farms where he is the "pork guru", there is a Chinese pork production video featuring my Brother, he's kind of a folk hero in that community in China, so he tells me....
Now, they've had a chance to get to know one another, My Brother's confidence level/HOPE has gone way up, and they've made a connection. In fact the Dr. has him down for a couple more chemo's and then to enter a clinical trial. So yes, America is a place where Dr's and other health professionals do wind up, and gain respect, and even make real friends... among their colleagues and patients.
If the situation there again were to be reversed??? do you feel an American would be accepted in China, I know of at least one American Dr. who was treating and caring for the Chinese out of a sense of "God's calling" if you will indulge me?? he was murdered by the Communists...
I love medicine, I believe it does bring people together, and I believe that we should help one another...
So its only fair to consider how these things would play out in a reciprocal circumstance, I would guarantee that in most situations, people in the US do treat others fairly and honestly, I would say we are in general a very open society, but if you and I were to visit any other country, its likely that it would take a while to be accepted?? yes???
our friend vesicles is a clinical researcher in Houston, maybe you can weigh in here Brother? I'm sure he likely has encountered some who might be less than kind and friendly?? I hope not, but people everywhere tend to be suspicious of people who are from another culture and country?