Torbjørn Færøvik's Blog, page 66

Tibetan resistance veterans offer legacy of unity, defiance in their twilight years

In the tranquil hills of Nepal’s Gandaki province, where the land rises in its northern district of Mustang toward the border with Tibet, the pace of life has slowed for the last legion of the Tibetan armed resistance. Now in their twilight years, these are the warriors who mounted a united campaign from the 1950s through to the mid-1970s against the Chinese occupation of their homeland. They

Torbjørn Færøvik: The terrifying ghost of McCarthyism once again haunts America

Ghosts never disappear. They merely hide, only to reappear once more. The terrifying ghost of McCarthyism is a good example. This spring marks 75 years since Senator Joe McCarthy was at the height of his rampage in the United States. He claimed to see communists and enemies of the people everywhere, unleashing an unparalleled uproar. It took four years to stop him. He berated his political

Students or spies? The young Chinese caught in Trump's crosshairs

Xiao Chen turned up at the US Consulate in Shanghai on Thursday morning, hours after Washington announced that it would "aggressively" revoke the visas of Chinese students. The 22-year-old had a visa appointment: she was headed to Michigan in the autumn to study communications.  After a "pleasant" conversation, she was told her application had been rejected. She was not given a reason. "I

Dreams cut short, Chinese students anxious and angry over ‘aggressive’ US visa ban plans

Kiwi Zhang, a computer science student from China, was full of hope for his academic future in the United States – until his visa was revoked at the US border last week.The first-year PhD student at a university in central US had just presented his research at a conference in Asia. He was returning to the US after a brief visit home when his American dream was abruptly cut short.According to

Trump administration took action against China due to frustration on trade talks, officials say

The flurry of punitive measures taken against China by the Trump administration over the last few days was prompted by a belief among US officials that China has failed to live up to commitments it made in trade talks earlier this month, three administration officials told CNN.This week the administration made moves to revoke visas for Chinese students and suspend the sale of some critical

India says over 1,000 nationals deported by US since January

More than a thousand Indians have "come back or [been] deported" from the United States since January, India's foreign ministry has said. Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said that around 62% of them came on commercial flights, without providing more details. This comes in the wake of President Donald Trump's campaign against undocumented migrants to the US. Trump had earlier said that India "will do

The Chinese Families Choosing an African Education

In 2018, while I was conducting fieldwork in Zimbabwe, I met a Chinese man who shared a surprising story. One night, he heard his 4-year-old daughter sleep-talking in English. The next day he called his wife in China and the couple decided to send the child back home. Only after the girl finished elementary school was she brought back to Zimbabwe to attend secondary school. She then went on to

China thought it had a truce with the US. Then Trump dropped two bombshells

A one-two punch from the United States risks shattering the already fragile trade war truce between Washington and Beijing, with Chinese tech companies and students both dealt shock blows by the Trump administration Wednesday night. Viewed from within China, things had been looking up after the world’s two largest economies agreed to dramatically roll back steep tariffs – a conciliatory step in a

Trump administration will ‘aggressively revoke’ Chinese student visas in major escalation with Beijing

The United States will “aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Wednesday in a major escalation of tensions with Beijing, and another blow to American higher education institutions.The plan was met with strong opposition from China, which said on Thursday it had lodged a formal protest with the US over what it called a “politically motivated and

China now collects more in debt from borrowers in the developing world than it extends in loans

China’s role in developing countries’ finances has transformed from capital provider to chief debt collector as a “tidal wave” of repayments due on loans Beijing extended under its Belt and Road Initiative far outstrip new disbursements, a new report by an Australian think tank showed.Under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Beijing has disbursed over $1 trillion in loans to more than 150