U.S to end five China-funded exchange programs

AKIPRESS.COM - The U.S. State Department is terminating five Chinese-funded exchange programs with the United States, calling them propaganda tools for Beijing, The Straits Times reported.
The Department said on its website that the programs are the Policymakers Educational China Trip Program, the US-China Friendship Program, the US-China Leadership Exchange Program, the US-China Transpacific Exchange Program and the Hong Kong Educational and Cultural Program.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said these programs - conducted under a US law called the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act (MECEA) that permits American government employees to travel using foreign government funds - were disguised as cultural exchanges.
"While other programs funded under the auspices of the MECEA are mutually beneficial, the five programs in question are fully funded and operated by the PRC government as soft power propaganda tools," Mr Pompeo said, referring to the People's Republic of China.
"They provide carefully curated access to Chinese Communist Party officials, not to the Chinese people, who do not enjoy freedoms of speech and assembly."
MECEA is a 1961 law signed by then President John F. Kennedy and aimed at boosting academic and cultural exchanges with foreign countries.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately return a message seeking comment on the move.
Attempts to reach representatives for the programs singled out by the State Department were not immediately successful.
The termination of the programs is the latest reflection of President Donald Trump's sharply antagonistic relationship with China.
Under Trump, the US launched a trade war with Beijing, has challenged Beijing's territorial ambitions in disputed Asian waters, criticized its crackdown on freedoms in Hong Kong and blamed China's handling of the initial coronavirus outbreak of the pandemic now engulfing the globe.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration on December 4 opted not to grant ByteDance a new extension of an order requiring the Chinese company to divest TikTok's US assets, but talks will continue over the short video-sharing app's fate, two sources briefed on the matter said. The Trump administration contends that TikTok poses national security concerns as the personal data of US users could be obtained by China's government.