今天美国司法部宣布废弃川普时代“China Initiative"名称

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在此项目下,对一些中国教授,学者进行不公平的审查。放弃这个标签的部分原因是还有来自于俄国,伊朗和朝鲜的威胁。​

US drops name of Trump’s ‘China Initiative’ after criticism​

By ERIC TUCKERan hour ago

FILE - Matthew G. Olsen, of Maryland, nominee to be an Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice, attends a Senate Judiciary Hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on July 14, 2021. The Justice Department is ending its China Initiative. The move announced Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022, by Assistant Attorney General Olsen amounts to a rebranding of a Trump-era program that was created to crack down on economic espionage by Beijing but that critics said had unfairly scrutinized Chinese professors on the basis of their ethnicity. (AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades, File)

FILE - Matthew G. Olsen, of Maryland, nominee to be an Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice, attends a Senate Judiciary Hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on July 14, 2021. The Justice Department is ending its China Initiative. The move announced Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022, by Assistant Attorney General Olsen amounts to a rebranding of a Trump-era program that was created to crack down on economic espionage by Beijing but that critics said had unfairly scrutinized Chinese professors on the basis of their ethnicity. (AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is scrapping the name of a Trump-era initiative that was intended to crack down on economic espionage by Beijing but has been criticized as unfairly targeting Chinese professors at American colleges because of their ethnicity.

The decision to abandon the China Initiative and to impose a higher bar for prosecutions of professors was announced Wednesday by the Justice Department’s top national security official. It follows a monthslong review undertaken after complaints that the program chilled academic collaboration and contributed to anti-Asian bias. The department has also endured high-profile setbacks in individual prosecutions, resulting in the dismissal of multiple criminal cases against academic researchers in the last year.

Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen said the department will still “be relentless in defending our country from China,” but no longer will group its investigations and prosecutions under the China Initiative label, in part out of recognition of the threats facing the U.S. from Russia, Iran, North Korea and others.

“I’m convinced that we need a broader approach, one that looks across all of these threats and uses all of our authorities to combat them,” he told reporters before a speech in which he detailed the changes.

The program was established in 2018 under then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions as a way to thwart what officials said were aggressive efforts by China to steal American intellectual property and to spy on American industry and research.

Olsen told reporters he believed the initiative was prompted by genuine national security concerns. He said he did not believe investigators had targeted professors on the basis of ethnicity, but he also said he had to be responsive to concerns he heard, including from Asian American groups.

“Anything that creates the impression that the Department of Justice applies different standards based on race or ethnicity harms the department and our efforts, and it harms the public,” Olsen said.

Speaking later in the day at the National Security Institute at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School, Olsen said that by “grouping cases under the China Initiative rubric, we helped give rise to a harmful perception that the (Justice Department) applies a lower standard to its investigations and prosecutions of criminal conduct related to that country or that we in some way view people with racial, ethnic or familial ties to China differently.”

Some Asian American groups and officials who had lobbied the department to end the China Initiative cheered the move Wednesday. Rep. Judy Chu, a California Democrat and the chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said the initiative had ruined careers, discouraged Asian Americans from pursuing academic specialties in science, technology, engineering and math and reinforced “harmful stereotypes.”

“There are serious national security concerns facing our country from all across the world, but our response must be based on evidence, not racism and fear,” Chu said in a statement.

The initiative has resulted in convictions, including of Charles Lieber, a Harvard University professor who was found guilty in December of hiding his ties to a Chinese-run recruitment program.

But its pursuit of professors, including those accused of concealing ties to the Chinese government on applications for federal research grants, hit snags. The department in the last year dismissed multiple cases against researchers or had them thrown out by judges.

In January, the department dropped its case against Gang Chen, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor charged in the final days of the Trump administration. Prosecutors concluded that they could no longer meet their burden of proof after they received information from the Department of Energy suggesting he had not been required to disclose certain information on his forms.

A federal judge in September threw out all charges against a University of Tennessee professor accused of hiding his relationship with a Chinese university while receiving research grants from NASA, and the university has since offered to reinstate him.

Olsen said the department continued to stand behind the pending cases it has against academics and researchers, signaling that those prosecutions won’t necessarily be abandoned.

Federal prosecutors are still expected to pursue grant fraud cases against researchers when there is evidence of malicious intent, serious fraud and a connection to economic and national security, with prosecutors from the department’s National Security Division in Washington playing an active supervisory role — though in some cases, prosecutors may opt for civil or administrative solutions instead of criminal charges, Olsen said.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a speech last month that the threat from China was “more brazen” than ever, with the FBI opening new cases to counter Chinese intelligence operations every 12 hours or so. And Olsen said he agreed.

“I’m not taking any tools off the table here,” Olsen said. He also noted, “I do not think that there is a reason to step back from that threat, and we will not step back from that threat.”

 

美司法部结束“中国行动计划” 中国威胁仍是打击重点​

2022年2月24日 09:41
美国司法部主管国家安全事务的助理部长马修·奥尔森

美国司法部主管国家安全事务的助理部长马修·奥尔森


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华盛顿 —
美国司法部星期三(2月23日)宣布结束前总统特朗普时期启动的“中国行动计划” (China Initiative),但同时强调了中国给美国国家安全带来的强大威胁,司法部官员表示将持续通过各类手段应对来自中国的不法活动,保护美国的国家利益。

“尽管我将继续关注中国政府构成的不断变化的严重威胁,” 司法部主管国家安全事务的助理部长马修·奥尔森 (Matthew Olsen)说,“我得到的结论是,这个计划并不是正确的方式。

司法部将启动新的战略,把国家安全方面的打击重点由中国扩大到多个敌对国家,包括俄罗斯、伊朗和朝鲜等。

“这些国家企图破坏我们的核心民主、经济和科学机构,” 奥尔森在乔治·梅森大学讲话时说,“他们不断采取更多策略来推进他们的利益,并伤害美国。捍卫美国机构和价值观免遭这些威胁是国家安全方面的当务之急,也是司法部的首要任务之一。”

奥尔森指出,这些国家对美国进行了多次网络攻击,并通过非法代理人试图影响美国的国内政治,迫害美国境内的个人,同时在经济方面偷盗美国的科技和研究,并逃脱出口管控。

乔治城大学安全与新兴技术中心分析师艾米丽·韦恩斯坦 (Emily Weinstein) 赞扬了司法部的这一举措,她认为这“反映了中国并不是我们今天面对的唯一挑战。”

“我不确定这个新战略在实际应用中会表现如何,” 她说,“但从消息传递的角度来说,这向前迈了一步。”

劳夫曼:中国威胁没有任何一国可比拟

奥尔森在讲话中还说,尽管“中国行动计划”已是过往,但司法部将继续全力应对来自中国的威胁。

他指出,中国正对美国采取一系列非法行为,包括经济间谍,偷盗贸易秘密,恶意网络攻击,以及通过“猎狐行动”等抓捕在美国境内的中国异议人士。

“无需怀疑,我们将继续竭尽全力捍卫我们的国家免受中国伤害,” 他说。“司法部会继续优先应对并积极反制中华人民共和国政府伤害我们的人民和机构的行为。”

“中国行动计划”于2018年启动,旨在应对长期以来由中国发动的经济间谍等危害美国国家安全的活动。

“在我担任反情报和出口控制部主任时,绝大多数针对美国的国家安全和经济利益的威胁,特别是在盗窃美国知识产权领域都来自中国,没有另一个国家可以比拟,” 大卫·劳夫曼 (David Laufman)告诉美国之音。他于2014至2018年间在司法部任职。

在“中国行动计划”启动后的三年里,包括华为首席财务官孟晚舟在内的数十名嫌疑人向司法部承认被指控罪名,部分被判入狱。

但在被起诉的嫌疑人中,高比例的华裔面孔也引发外界对该计划“种族定性” (Racial Profiling) 的担忧和批评。而多起针对大学教授的指控也被认为给美国学术界带来了“寒蝉效应”。
奥尔森:司法部打击的是中国政府及其代理人
助理部长奥尔森此前对“中国行动计划”进行了多个月的评估。他表示,在评估过程中,他听取了一些美国民权组织有关种族歧视的担忧。

奥尔森表示理解担忧的存在,但指出他在评估过程中并没有发现司法部的任何行动是出于种族歧视。

他重申,司法部打击的目标不是华人,而是中国政府、中国共产党,和他们的代理人。但司法部也意识到“中国行动计划”给华裔群体和学术界带来的负面影响。

美国大型民权组织“美国公民自由联盟” (ACLU) 对司法部结束“中国行动计划”表达了一定程度的赞许,但也希望看到更多行动。

在一份给美国之音的声明中,ALCU高级职员律师帕特里克·图米 (Patrick Toomey) 说:“移除(项目)的名字还不够。如果要保证这个歧视性的项目真正彻底结束,拜登当局必须对司法部长期以来以国家安全为名的种族定性政策进行根本性的改革。”

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