University president warns Chinese students not to harass other Chinese on campus

A U.S. university president who is a former governor of Indiana has condemned Chinese nationalist students in his state who harassed a Chinese pro-democracy graduate student for openly praising Tiananmen Square protesters. Mitch Daniels, president of Purdue University, a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, sent an email to members of the campus community on Wednesday, saying that the treatment of the student, Kong Zhihao — whom Daniels did not name in the message — was “unacceptable and unwelcome.”

The incident stems from a November report by the U.S. media organization ProPublica about how the Chinese government is threatening Chinese students at American universities who openly criticize Beijing, and harassing their families back home.

Kong posted an open letter on a dissident website in May 2020, praising the bravery of students killed during the Tiananmen Square massacre in June 1989, and his intent to participate in a 31st anniversary online commemoration of the event, organized by rights groups, ProPublica reported.

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