No to more cooperation with China at UiO

Chinese investments and academic cooperation at the university level have brought on concerns about academic freedom and interference. In Chinese public universities, apart from the president, there has to be one Secretary of Party Committee from the government to supervise the operation of the university, which means the academic environment in China is restrained by political power.[1]

It is notorious that in many Western universities, Chinese influences attempt to censor students’ opinions against the Chinese Communist Party, even if they are not Chinese citizens. The parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security inquiry in Australia found examples of attempts to threaten and intimidate staff and students, espionage, and intellectual property theft through collaborations with foreign institutions.[2] The report also singled out Chinese government-funded Confucius Institutes, a $10m deal between Monash University and a Chinese company linked to industrial espionage.

• In one case, a student at a Zoom meeting displaying a Hong Kong independence flag was told by another student they would be reported.[3]
• Another case is an Australian student, Drew Pavlou, from University of Queensland was expelled after he criticised the Chinese Communist Party and supported Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protesters. One of the allegations from the university was ‘damaging the university’s reputation by condemning police attacks on student protesters in Hong Kong in November.’[4]

In addition, media from seven European countries conducted an investigation and concluded that technology information obtained through academic cooperation between European universities and Chinese universities can be used in the Chinese military. The investigation went through about 350,000 scientific articles in which European researchers have been co-authored, and found out about 3000 articles co-authored with Chinese colleagues with ties to the Chinese military. In particular, the collection of knowledge about drones, robots and artificial intelligence takes place on a large scale.

• A group of scientists, including one affiliated with National University of Defense Technology in China, were working on a system to track people, even if they cover up themselves. The goal is to help fight crime but can also be used in authoritarian regime like China against its own population, especially after the UN’s High Commissioner of Human Rights released a report on concerns in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, People’s Republic of China this year[5], which pointed out that China may commit crime against humanity to the Uyghur.[6]

University of Bergen has closed down the Chinese Confucius Institute that had over 10 years of partnership, and University of Copenhagen has closed down FUDAN-European Centre for China Studies, both because of mistrust for China.[7] However, in 2021, University of Oslo chose to open Fudan European Center for Chinese Studies[8] and claimed this will make it the leading university in Norway,[9] by cooperating with one of the most dangerous political actors to our freedom and values. The centre serves as a platform to have more academic cooperation between China and UiO as well as to build networking with Chinese academia. With the situation of how China is stealing important information and penetrating universities in the name of academic cooperation, UiO is opening the door for China to increase its influence and can have negative effects on students’ freedom of speech and academic freedom of our university. The students in UiO should not be sacrificed for the reputation of UiO.

The Student Parliament in University of Oslo will: 

• Urge the University of Oslo to suspend the agreement on FUDAN-European Centre for China Studies with Fudan University, China
• Encourage the University of Oslo to seek alternative partnering countries for Chinese Studies, which values human rights and democracy, and provides freedom of academic environment, such as Taiwan
• Work on stopping Chinese investments and Chinese technology into the Oslo Science City project

• Discourage the University of Oslo to increase academic cooperation with Chinese academia