The arrest of an Indiana University student from China that U.S. investigators say is related to an intelligence-gathering scheme, is unlikely to change IU policies.
“I don’t know that it had any effect on what we do,” said Fred Cate, vice president for research at IU.
Zhao Kaikai, a Ph.D. candidate in IU’s Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering, was indicted and accused of lying on his visa application and lying to federal investigators about his years of military service in China. But those aren’t matters IU has control over. Universities play no role in granting visas, Cate said.
There is, of course, a larger issue at hand. Zhao’s arrest on July 18 stemmed from rising concern in the Trump administration over what U.S. intelligence officials depict as an intelligence-gathering operation aided by Chinese diplomats to collect cutting-edge scientific research from American universities.
Some have suggested IU leaders have turned a blind eye to the risks of accepting large numbers of students from a Communist country because of the money they bring to the university. Cate disputed this notion.
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