When looking at the picture of our first Feature, the first thing that comes to mind is animal welfare. Why is our closest conspecific suffering behind bars? In fact, from a medical point of view, experimental monkeys are needed for the approval of some important drugs – and many of these experimental animals came from Chinese breeding stations until recently. Since the beginning of the pandemic, however, China has no longer exported any experimental monkeys. And promptly, the Chinese once again realized how difficult it is to replace them as suppliers, as Amelie Richter explains. China sees the bottleneck in Europe as an opportunity to become the leader in primate research. From a German research perspective, these are not good prospects.
The West apparently miscalculated in the Pacific region, as Frank Sieren writes in his Feature. After the Solomon Islands, Fiji now has a prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka, who allowed himself to be lulled by China. For a long time, these island states were seen by many as exotic South Sea islands at best but otherwise largely irrelevant. But now Beijing’s growing influence in the region is becoming a problem for Australia, New Zealand, and above all for the United States – and thus for the West as a whole. The Pacific has long since ceased to be the “Quiet Ocean,” as it was still referred to in my school atlas from the 1980s, and is now a focal point of global political importance.
Biomedical research in the EU continues to test preparations on monkeys. For example, anyone vaccinated against the coronavirus with a vaccine approved in the EU has received a vaccine tested on experimental monkeys. The animals are irreplaceable for some of this biomedical research. Thus, while the search for vaccines and drugs against Covid has been underway, the need for animals has grown rapidly in recent years.
Until 2020, the majority of experimental monkeys was imported from China. However, the People’s Republic stopped the export at the very beginning of the Covid pandemic. At that time, it was not certain whether the experimental primates could also transmit the coronavirus. However, Beijing has not lifted the export ban since. As a result, it has become increasingly difficult for Europe as a research location to obtain suitable laboratory monkeys. A recently enacted stricter EU regulation on which monkeys may be used for research further exacerbates the situation for laboratories.
Due to more difficult access to research primates and rising costs, research in the EU could become less attractive in the future – and migrate to China. Even before the onset of the Covid pandemic, China had increasingly focused on primate research. Since about 2015, Beijing has poured massive funding into the field, estimates Kirk Leech. The British scientist is executive director of the European Animal Research Association. With the export ban, he believes China has clearly shown its intention to dominate this research area in the long term.
Stefan Treue, director of the German Primate Center (DPZ), also does not believe that the situation in the EU will improve soon. “If anything, the problem is becoming more pressing.” The effects of the export ban are also being felt at the DPZ, Treue explains. Because of the current very high demand for laboratory animals for Covid research, the center would normally buy monkeys in addition, Treue says. But there are none on the market. “If there are no animals, money won’t help them.”
Other Asian countries, such as Thailand and Cambodia, breed monkeys on a smaller scale. “But that doesn’t come close to the number China used to export.” For Treue, the fact that the export ban continues to be upheld now has a clear scientific-political-strategic background. There is also a high demand in the People’s Republic itself, which is why the biologist assumes that even if the export ban were lifted, the previous export figures would no longer be reached.
The DPZ in Göttingen is a publicly funded non-university research institution. The animals that the center needs for its basic research are mostly bred there. However, the DPZ also provides animals to other academic research institutions in Germany. Until the Chinese export ban, Germany needed between 2,000 and 3,000 experimental monkeys per year, mostly for legally required drug tests by pharmaceutical companies, Treue explains. In total, there were around 10,000 in Europe.
Brussels now also causes problems: According to a new EU regulation, European companies and research institutions have only been allowed to use animals from the so-called F2 generation since November. F0 animals are born in the wild. F1 animals are their offspring, and F2 is the next generation. The EU decided on this regulation a good ten years ago. However, the transition period did not expire until November 2022.
“The transition period was set before the current crisis – with the expectation that this would give breeders time to build up their breedings to meet the demand with F2 animals,” says Treue. To breed an F2 generation, however, F1 must be available. In the current crisis, demand is so great that breeders are selling animals to countries with no such generation restrictions, according to the biologist.
The EU Commission is aware of the situation, a spokeswoman said upon request. She pointed to the possibility of EU countries allowing exceptions. “Here, it would be important for EU countries to find a sensible balance between banning the continued use of certain animals and the risks of this rule for animal welfare and science in Europe,” Treue stressed.
Otherwise, the only long-term solution for Europe is to localize breeding, as British researcher Leech explains. However, he adds, the EU Commission must also work to achieve this. “If Europe wants to take the issue of resilience seriously, it’s not just about masks or medical suits.”
He also said that the company needs to think about its own supply of primates for research. “The monkeys are not going to fall into our laps,” Leech comments. While he acknowledges that it was difficult to foresee the situation turning out the way it is now, he says the EU has not taken steps to improve the necessary supply chains. But so far, the EU has not taken steps to better organize the necessary supply chains, Leech says. Now, he says, EU member states must consider whether to continue allowing F1 primates. Otherwise, Europe risks an exodus of research in this area.
Change of times in Fiji: In his first interview as the new prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka announced that he would “rethink” the traditional security partnerships with the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. These partners have seen Fiji only as “output of their colonial regimes of the past and have not reorientated their thinking to the international landscape where we are all equal.” China, on the other hand, “has come in with a blank sheet of paper,” the 74-year-old said. “They have seen us as just development partners.”
Washington, but also Canberra and Wellington, listen closely to such sounds. At the latest, since Beijing concluded a security partnership with the neighboring Solomon Islands last April and Chinese police units are already training the police there and giving the Chinese military access to its ports, the Western states are alarmed.
However, the region has been strategically important since World War II. In the Pacific War, Japan and the US fought for control of the Polynesian islands. At stake, after all, is a region three times the size of the United States, between America and Asia. It stretches from Hawaii to the Philippines in the west, Australia and New Zealand in the south, and Japan in the north. It is no coincidence that Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, the Solomon Islands and the United States Minor Outlying Islands belong to the US to this day. And French Polynesia or New Caledonia continue to belong to France.
But for too long, France, Australia, and especially the United States were confident that they controlled the region. Even US Vice President Kamala Harris acknowledged as much on her hastily scheduled trip to the region last summer: “We recognize that in recent years, the Pacific Islands may not have received the diplomatic attention and support that they deserve.” She promised to change that now.
The New York Times goes even further in its assessment of the situation: “China is miles ahead in a pacific race for influence.” That, it says, “exposes what America’s descent looks like.” But as far as Fiji is concerned, the baby may have already fallen into the well. Even though US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last February became the first US secretary of state in 36 years to visit Fiji.
Rabuka, the former brigadier general who now governs some 900,000 people on 300 islands, trained in New Zealand and at the British military cadre school Sandhurst and was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire by the Queen. But Fiji’s independence in 1970 was not enough for him. Formal dependence had been followed by informal dependence. For the Queen was still head of state, London kept interfering, and the Indians who had settled in Fiji under British rule and were now considered natives became increasingly important politically.
So in 1987, Rabuka, nicknamed “Rambo”, launched two coups in one year, establishing a republic and thus deposing the Queen as head of state. At the same time, he pushed back the power of the Indian natives. He has since apologized for this. He is still considered a hero by the people for founding the republic. As punishment, Fiji was promptly expelled from the Commonwealth, the union of independent states that succeeded the British Empire and in which members enjoy economic advantages, among other things.
Rabuka had to learn in his seven years as prime minister how difficult it was to make it economically on his own when he took off his uniform and became prime minister for the first time in 1992. The Chinese were not yet ready to step in with investments. Rabuka had to give up in 1999. Economically, Fiji had been at the end of its resources. In London, this was noted with satisfaction. But his successor did not last long either. He was ousted in 2006 by military chief Josaia Voreqe “Frank” Bainimarama. Once again, Fiji was excluded from the Commonwealth.
But now, the Chinese jumped into this gap and invested massively. They stayed even after the free elections in 2014, when the Commonwealth loved Fiji again and Australia and New Zealand also provided development aid.
People were torn about the involvement of the Chinese. On the one hand, it meant new infrastructure; on the other, there was growing concern that the Chinese would secure the best land. But when in 2020, during a stage 5 typhoon, a Chinese-built school in Lekutu was one of the very few buildings that withstood the storm and where people could seek shelter, sentiment turned in favor of the People’s Republic. Prime Minister Rabuka is counting on this mood after his surprising re-election.
For him, it’s less about China being politically better than the US and more about something else: For the first time in his political life, Rabuka feels he is no longer dependent on one major power, for better or worse, but can negotiate the best deal for his country with at least two major powers. For the first time, he hopes, he is ruling a truly independent country: “We are now an equal partner for other nations.” Now, however, foreign countries are no longer to blame if Fiji doesn’t take off economically. And Rabuka must now deliver because he narrowly won the first free elections in 16 years.
The European Parliament wants to restrict technology transfers to China in the chip industry. “Given the offensive espionage program of the Chinese government, we no longer want any transfer of intellectual property to China,” said Dutch MEP Bart Groothuis, shadow rapporteur for the Liberals in the lead industry committee.
The committee adopted amendments to the Commission proposal on the Chips Act with a large majority on Tuesday, according to which a corresponding article (27 a) would be added. The report by rapporteur Dan Nica (S&D) is the basis for the final negotiations of the European Parliament with the member states. The approval of the plenary in February is considered a formality. The Chips Act’s goal is to strengthen Europe as a location for research and production in the strategically important sector and to prepare it for supply bottlenecks.
MEPs call for semiconductor companies to be allowed to transfer trade secrets and IP-protected information only to third countries with which agreements on the protection of intellectual property exist. Companies receiving government funding under the Chips Act should commit in agreements with the Commission or the relevant member state not to transfer such information. Existing works or technology for older generations of chips would be exempt. In the event of violations, the companies would have to pay back the state aid.
The MPs’ move is likely to be welcomed in Washington: In October, the US government imposed far-reaching export restrictions to make it more complicated for Chinese manufacturers to access modern chip technology. Washington is particularly pressing the Netherlands, home of leading chip maker ASML, to follow suit. The Hague agreed to halt exports of advanced EUV machines. However, the government is hesitant about technology that ASML has already supplied to China.
The new China article is one of several changes MEPs want to make to the Commission proposal. The member states had already decided on their negotiating position for the trilogue at the beginning of December.
Parliament sharpens up on these points:
Disease experts at the London-based research institute Airfinity have adjusted their forecast for the course of the Covid spread in China. Instead of two delineated waves, the modelers now expect an elongated mountain range with several peaks. However, starting on Jan. 27, which is Friday, the case rate is expected to fall again. It will then remain low for the foreseeable future because of acquired immunity in the population. The first round of the contagion would therefore be over by the weekend.
According to Airfinity, the peak number of new infections will be 4.8 million per day. The pressure on hospitals will remain high in the coming weeks because some severe courses will take a long time. The death toll is expected to peak Thursday at 36,000 deaths in one day, according to the calculations. About 848,000 people have died with or from Covid since early December, according to those estimates.
There are no reliable figures. China’s leadership has largely stopped blanket testing since the abrupt opening on Dec. 7. Instead, low numbers are announced, but they are unrealistic. Chinese experts admit that the spread of the virus has “accelerated more than expected” due to the Chinese New Year travel wave that began in mid-January. According to estimates by leading epidemiologist Wu Zunyou of the National Health Department (CDC), up to 80 percent of all Chinese are likely to have contracted the virus. That would be more than one billion people. flee
The Bertelsmann Transformation Index (BTI) shows that, for the first time since 2004, there are more autocratic than democratically governed states. However, neither the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), nor the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) take this finding into account. Concrete guidance on how to proceed with research cooperation in autocratically governed states is still awaited.
Collaboration with Chinese researchers today must take into account that the entire Chinese educational sector should serve the Party’s goals exclusively. This means that faculty members (our potential research partners) are selected and promoted based on their patriotic qualifications and socialist moral character. Here it is illusory to assume independence from the state party and the educational system. Such a separation is not found in other authoritarian systems either because their educational content is always ideologically motivated.
In particular, because the freedom of research and teaching is enshrined in Germany’s Basic Law, we have a responsibility to ensure that this academic freedom is also upheld in our academic collaborations with foreign partners.
In 2020, the DAAD already noted that the Chinese state is increasingly supporting its young scientists itself, e.g., through doctoral scholarships on the part of the Chinese Scholarship Council (CSC). Recently, it was reported that these scholarships require party loyalty on the part of their recipients. This substantially limits the possibilities for collaborative, uninfluenced and critical research in Germany.
Research and science in China have the task of advancing the party’s socio-political agenda, which is very strongly oriented toward “social stability”. Here, the technical and natural sciences, as well as the humanities and social sciences, are equally appropriated for party goals. The latter serve the propaganda apparatus by imparting “patriotic education,” while the technical sciences, in particular, are used for civil-military developments and further developments of the surveillance apparatus. This appropriation of science for political-ideological purposes must always be present to us in scientific cooperation with authoritarian or autocratically led states.
The extent to which the German higher education system ultimately benefits from Chinese students, doctoral candidates and researchers is not empirically proven. It is undeniable that they contribute to the diversity of our higher education system. However, this does not allow us to draw any conclusions about their academic achievements, particularly since these would then have to be measured against the achievements of other German and foreign researchers in Germany.
Moreover, this assertion completely omits legal developments that are relevant in this context. For example, the National Intelligence Law of 2017 enables the Chinese government to oblige every citizen of their country to cooperate with intelligence services. Scientists, in particular, play an important role here, as they have access to relevant knowledge. Those who go abroad are reminded by the Chinese embassies to give back to the motherland (回报祖国). And there are various government programs to make such knowledge from stays abroad strategically useful.
In this respect, it is essential that all scientific institutions in Germany address the possibility of systematic screening of Chinese visiting scientists and doctoral students. This is the only way to prevent undesirable influences and intelligence activities. This is particularly relevant in the technical and natural sciences. Scholarship providers such as the DAAD or various foundations should also check their own Chinese scholarship holders.
The conditions of scientific cooperation with China must be reconfigured accordingly in the Xi era. For the time being, a decline in ideologization, which also affects the Chinese education system, cannot be assumed. Universities in China may have gone through politically difficult times before. Nevertheless, this is no reason not to take the current changes into account.
We need an appropriate and binding risk assessment and risk management for cooperation with Chinese scientists and institutions (for example, as in the MIT Guidelines). These measures also have nothing to do with a ban on cooperation. There is still room for cooperation, but it has become much smaller under Xi’s ideologically driven policies. All the more reason to take a closer look at ongoing and future research collaborations.
The Chinese New Year celebrations are in full swing. The colorful fairs with lots of sweet treats are very popular, like here in Yinping, a village in Guizhou province. The works of art made of caramel are almost too good to be eaten – a conflict of goals that usually results in a clear decision.
When looking at the picture of our first Feature, the first thing that comes to mind is animal welfare. Why is our closest conspecific suffering behind bars? In fact, from a medical point of view, experimental monkeys are needed for the approval of some important drugs – and many of these experimental animals came from Chinese breeding stations until recently. Since the beginning of the pandemic, however, China has no longer exported any experimental monkeys. And promptly, the Chinese once again realized how difficult it is to replace them as suppliers, as Amelie Richter explains. China sees the bottleneck in Europe as an opportunity to become the leader in primate research. From a German research perspective, these are not good prospects.
The West apparently miscalculated in the Pacific region, as Frank Sieren writes in his Feature. After the Solomon Islands, Fiji now has a prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka, who allowed himself to be lulled by China. For a long time, these island states were seen by many as exotic South Sea islands at best but otherwise largely irrelevant. But now Beijing’s growing influence in the region is becoming a problem for Australia, New Zealand, and above all for the United States – and thus for the West as a whole. The Pacific has long since ceased to be the “Quiet Ocean,” as it was still referred to in my school atlas from the 1980s, and is now a focal point of global political importance.
Biomedical research in the EU continues to test preparations on monkeys. For example, anyone vaccinated against the coronavirus with a vaccine approved in the EU has received a vaccine tested on experimental monkeys. The animals are irreplaceable for some of this biomedical research. Thus, while the search for vaccines and drugs against Covid has been underway, the need for animals has grown rapidly in recent years.
Until 2020, the majority of experimental monkeys was imported from China. However, the People’s Republic stopped the export at the very beginning of the Covid pandemic. At that time, it was not certain whether the experimental primates could also transmit the coronavirus. However, Beijing has not lifted the export ban since. As a result, it has become increasingly difficult for Europe as a research location to obtain suitable laboratory monkeys. A recently enacted stricter EU regulation on which monkeys may be used for research further exacerbates the situation for laboratories.
Due to more difficult access to research primates and rising costs, research in the EU could become less attractive in the future – and migrate to China. Even before the onset of the Covid pandemic, China had increasingly focused on primate research. Since about 2015, Beijing has poured massive funding into the field, estimates Kirk Leech. The British scientist is executive director of the European Animal Research Association. With the export ban, he believes China has clearly shown its intention to dominate this research area in the long term.
Stefan Treue, director of the German Primate Center (DPZ), also does not believe that the situation in the EU will improve soon. “If anything, the problem is becoming more pressing.” The effects of the export ban are also being felt at the DPZ, Treue explains. Because of the current very high demand for laboratory animals for Covid research, the center would normally buy monkeys in addition, Treue says. But there are none on the market. “If there are no animals, money won’t help them.”
Other Asian countries, such as Thailand and Cambodia, breed monkeys on a smaller scale. “But that doesn’t come close to the number China used to export.” For Treue, the fact that the export ban continues to be upheld now has a clear scientific-political-strategic background. There is also a high demand in the People’s Republic itself, which is why the biologist assumes that even if the export ban were lifted, the previous export figures would no longer be reached.
The DPZ in Göttingen is a publicly funded non-university research institution. The animals that the center needs for its basic research are mostly bred there. However, the DPZ also provides animals to other academic research institutions in Germany. Until the Chinese export ban, Germany needed between 2,000 and 3,000 experimental monkeys per year, mostly for legally required drug tests by pharmaceutical companies, Treue explains. In total, there were around 10,000 in Europe.
Brussels now also causes problems: According to a new EU regulation, European companies and research institutions have only been allowed to use animals from the so-called F2 generation since November. F0 animals are born in the wild. F1 animals are their offspring, and F2 is the next generation. The EU decided on this regulation a good ten years ago. However, the transition period did not expire until November 2022.
“The transition period was set before the current crisis – with the expectation that this would give breeders time to build up their breedings to meet the demand with F2 animals,” says Treue. To breed an F2 generation, however, F1 must be available. In the current crisis, demand is so great that breeders are selling animals to countries with no such generation restrictions, according to the biologist.
The EU Commission is aware of the situation, a spokeswoman said upon request. She pointed to the possibility of EU countries allowing exceptions. “Here, it would be important for EU countries to find a sensible balance between banning the continued use of certain animals and the risks of this rule for animal welfare and science in Europe,” Treue stressed.
Otherwise, the only long-term solution for Europe is to localize breeding, as British researcher Leech explains. However, he adds, the EU Commission must also work to achieve this. “If Europe wants to take the issue of resilience seriously, it’s not just about masks or medical suits.”
He also said that the company needs to think about its own supply of primates for research. “The monkeys are not going to fall into our laps,” Leech comments. While he acknowledges that it was difficult to foresee the situation turning out the way it is now, he says the EU has not taken steps to improve the necessary supply chains. But so far, the EU has not taken steps to better organize the necessary supply chains, Leech says. Now, he says, EU member states must consider whether to continue allowing F1 primates. Otherwise, Europe risks an exodus of research in this area.
Change of times in Fiji: In his first interview as the new prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka announced that he would “rethink” the traditional security partnerships with the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. These partners have seen Fiji only as “output of their colonial regimes of the past and have not reorientated their thinking to the international landscape where we are all equal.” China, on the other hand, “has come in with a blank sheet of paper,” the 74-year-old said. “They have seen us as just development partners.”
Washington, but also Canberra and Wellington, listen closely to such sounds. At the latest, since Beijing concluded a security partnership with the neighboring Solomon Islands last April and Chinese police units are already training the police there and giving the Chinese military access to its ports, the Western states are alarmed.
However, the region has been strategically important since World War II. In the Pacific War, Japan and the US fought for control of the Polynesian islands. At stake, after all, is a region three times the size of the United States, between America and Asia. It stretches from Hawaii to the Philippines in the west, Australia and New Zealand in the south, and Japan in the north. It is no coincidence that Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, the Solomon Islands and the United States Minor Outlying Islands belong to the US to this day. And French Polynesia or New Caledonia continue to belong to France.
But for too long, France, Australia, and especially the United States were confident that they controlled the region. Even US Vice President Kamala Harris acknowledged as much on her hastily scheduled trip to the region last summer: “We recognize that in recent years, the Pacific Islands may not have received the diplomatic attention and support that they deserve.” She promised to change that now.
The New York Times goes even further in its assessment of the situation: “China is miles ahead in a pacific race for influence.” That, it says, “exposes what America’s descent looks like.” But as far as Fiji is concerned, the baby may have already fallen into the well. Even though US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last February became the first US secretary of state in 36 years to visit Fiji.
Rabuka, the former brigadier general who now governs some 900,000 people on 300 islands, trained in New Zealand and at the British military cadre school Sandhurst and was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire by the Queen. But Fiji’s independence in 1970 was not enough for him. Formal dependence had been followed by informal dependence. For the Queen was still head of state, London kept interfering, and the Indians who had settled in Fiji under British rule and were now considered natives became increasingly important politically.
So in 1987, Rabuka, nicknamed “Rambo”, launched two coups in one year, establishing a republic and thus deposing the Queen as head of state. At the same time, he pushed back the power of the Indian natives. He has since apologized for this. He is still considered a hero by the people for founding the republic. As punishment, Fiji was promptly expelled from the Commonwealth, the union of independent states that succeeded the British Empire and in which members enjoy economic advantages, among other things.
Rabuka had to learn in his seven years as prime minister how difficult it was to make it economically on his own when he took off his uniform and became prime minister for the first time in 1992. The Chinese were not yet ready to step in with investments. Rabuka had to give up in 1999. Economically, Fiji had been at the end of its resources. In London, this was noted with satisfaction. But his successor did not last long either. He was ousted in 2006 by military chief Josaia Voreqe “Frank” Bainimarama. Once again, Fiji was excluded from the Commonwealth.
But now, the Chinese jumped into this gap and invested massively. They stayed even after the free elections in 2014, when the Commonwealth loved Fiji again and Australia and New Zealand also provided development aid.
People were torn about the involvement of the Chinese. On the one hand, it meant new infrastructure; on the other, there was growing concern that the Chinese would secure the best land. But when in 2020, during a stage 5 typhoon, a Chinese-built school in Lekutu was one of the very few buildings that withstood the storm and where people could seek shelter, sentiment turned in favor of the People’s Republic. Prime Minister Rabuka is counting on this mood after his surprising re-election.
For him, it’s less about China being politically better than the US and more about something else: For the first time in his political life, Rabuka feels he is no longer dependent on one major power, for better or worse, but can negotiate the best deal for his country with at least two major powers. For the first time, he hopes, he is ruling a truly independent country: “We are now an equal partner for other nations.” Now, however, foreign countries are no longer to blame if Fiji doesn’t take off economically. And Rabuka must now deliver because he narrowly won the first free elections in 16 years.
The European Parliament wants to restrict technology transfers to China in the chip industry. “Given the offensive espionage program of the Chinese government, we no longer want any transfer of intellectual property to China,” said Dutch MEP Bart Groothuis, shadow rapporteur for the Liberals in the lead industry committee.
The committee adopted amendments to the Commission proposal on the Chips Act with a large majority on Tuesday, according to which a corresponding article (27 a) would be added. The report by rapporteur Dan Nica (S&D) is the basis for the final negotiations of the European Parliament with the member states. The approval of the plenary in February is considered a formality. The Chips Act’s goal is to strengthen Europe as a location for research and production in the strategically important sector and to prepare it for supply bottlenecks.
MEPs call for semiconductor companies to be allowed to transfer trade secrets and IP-protected information only to third countries with which agreements on the protection of intellectual property exist. Companies receiving government funding under the Chips Act should commit in agreements with the Commission or the relevant member state not to transfer such information. Existing works or technology for older generations of chips would be exempt. In the event of violations, the companies would have to pay back the state aid.
The MPs’ move is likely to be welcomed in Washington: In October, the US government imposed far-reaching export restrictions to make it more complicated for Chinese manufacturers to access modern chip technology. Washington is particularly pressing the Netherlands, home of leading chip maker ASML, to follow suit. The Hague agreed to halt exports of advanced EUV machines. However, the government is hesitant about technology that ASML has already supplied to China.
The new China article is one of several changes MEPs want to make to the Commission proposal. The member states had already decided on their negotiating position for the trilogue at the beginning of December.
Parliament sharpens up on these points:
Disease experts at the London-based research institute Airfinity have adjusted their forecast for the course of the Covid spread in China. Instead of two delineated waves, the modelers now expect an elongated mountain range with several peaks. However, starting on Jan. 27, which is Friday, the case rate is expected to fall again. It will then remain low for the foreseeable future because of acquired immunity in the population. The first round of the contagion would therefore be over by the weekend.
According to Airfinity, the peak number of new infections will be 4.8 million per day. The pressure on hospitals will remain high in the coming weeks because some severe courses will take a long time. The death toll is expected to peak Thursday at 36,000 deaths in one day, according to the calculations. About 848,000 people have died with or from Covid since early December, according to those estimates.
There are no reliable figures. China’s leadership has largely stopped blanket testing since the abrupt opening on Dec. 7. Instead, low numbers are announced, but they are unrealistic. Chinese experts admit that the spread of the virus has “accelerated more than expected” due to the Chinese New Year travel wave that began in mid-January. According to estimates by leading epidemiologist Wu Zunyou of the National Health Department (CDC), up to 80 percent of all Chinese are likely to have contracted the virus. That would be more than one billion people. flee
The Bertelsmann Transformation Index (BTI) shows that, for the first time since 2004, there are more autocratic than democratically governed states. However, neither the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), nor the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) take this finding into account. Concrete guidance on how to proceed with research cooperation in autocratically governed states is still awaited.
Collaboration with Chinese researchers today must take into account that the entire Chinese educational sector should serve the Party’s goals exclusively. This means that faculty members (our potential research partners) are selected and promoted based on their patriotic qualifications and socialist moral character. Here it is illusory to assume independence from the state party and the educational system. Such a separation is not found in other authoritarian systems either because their educational content is always ideologically motivated.
In particular, because the freedom of research and teaching is enshrined in Germany’s Basic Law, we have a responsibility to ensure that this academic freedom is also upheld in our academic collaborations with foreign partners.
In 2020, the DAAD already noted that the Chinese state is increasingly supporting its young scientists itself, e.g., through doctoral scholarships on the part of the Chinese Scholarship Council (CSC). Recently, it was reported that these scholarships require party loyalty on the part of their recipients. This substantially limits the possibilities for collaborative, uninfluenced and critical research in Germany.
Research and science in China have the task of advancing the party’s socio-political agenda, which is very strongly oriented toward “social stability”. Here, the technical and natural sciences, as well as the humanities and social sciences, are equally appropriated for party goals. The latter serve the propaganda apparatus by imparting “patriotic education,” while the technical sciences, in particular, are used for civil-military developments and further developments of the surveillance apparatus. This appropriation of science for political-ideological purposes must always be present to us in scientific cooperation with authoritarian or autocratically led states.
The extent to which the German higher education system ultimately benefits from Chinese students, doctoral candidates and researchers is not empirically proven. It is undeniable that they contribute to the diversity of our higher education system. However, this does not allow us to draw any conclusions about their academic achievements, particularly since these would then have to be measured against the achievements of other German and foreign researchers in Germany.
Moreover, this assertion completely omits legal developments that are relevant in this context. For example, the National Intelligence Law of 2017 enables the Chinese government to oblige every citizen of their country to cooperate with intelligence services. Scientists, in particular, play an important role here, as they have access to relevant knowledge. Those who go abroad are reminded by the Chinese embassies to give back to the motherland (回报祖国). And there are various government programs to make such knowledge from stays abroad strategically useful.
In this respect, it is essential that all scientific institutions in Germany address the possibility of systematic screening of Chinese visiting scientists and doctoral students. This is the only way to prevent undesirable influences and intelligence activities. This is particularly relevant in the technical and natural sciences. Scholarship providers such as the DAAD or various foundations should also check their own Chinese scholarship holders.
The conditions of scientific cooperation with China must be reconfigured accordingly in the Xi era. For the time being, a decline in ideologization, which also affects the Chinese education system, cannot be assumed. Universities in China may have gone through politically difficult times before. Nevertheless, this is no reason not to take the current changes into account.
We need an appropriate and binding risk assessment and risk management for cooperation with Chinese scientists and institutions (for example, as in the MIT Guidelines). These measures also have nothing to do with a ban on cooperation. There is still room for cooperation, but it has become much smaller under Xi’s ideologically driven policies. All the more reason to take a closer look at ongoing and future research collaborations.
The Chinese New Year celebrations are in full swing. The colorful fairs with lots of sweet treats are very popular, like here in Yinping, a village in Guizhou province. The works of art made of caramel are almost too good to be eaten – a conflict of goals that usually results in a clear decision.
