Pompeio announced that the US Center of Confucius Institute should be registered as a “foreign mission”

[global network reporter Li Dongyao] on August 13, local time, U.S. Secretary of state pompeio announced that the US Center of Confucius Institute was required to be registered as a “foreign mission” after anonymous insiders released news in advance. Reuters said it was the latest sign of deteriorating relations between Washington and Beijing. According to Reuters, pompeio claimed in a statement that the U.S. Confucius Institute Center in Washington was “an entity that promotes Beijing’s global advocacy and malicious influence activities on American campuses and primary and secondary school classrooms.”. David Stilwell, assistant secretary of state for Asia Pacific Affairs of the US State Department, defended at a news conference that day that the policy was not directed at the Confucius Institutes in the United States, but the Confucius Institute American center coordinating these institutions. On this basis, according to a previous report by the Peng Bo news agency, an unnamed source said earlier that the US State Department would announce as early as the 13th that Confucius institutes set up in American universities must be registered as “foreign missions”. The decision means that the Confucius Institute, which is identified as an institution “actually owned or effectively controlled by a foreign government”, will be subject to administrative requirements similar to those of Chinese embassies and consulates, the person said. This is not the first time that the United States has listed relevant Chinese organizations as “foreign missions”. In February and June this year, the US State Department listed nine Chinese media as “foreign missions” in two batches. According to the foreign missions act of the United States, once registered as a “foreign mission”, a list of all staff members and their properties must be reported to the U.S. State Department. As for the groundless defamation of Confucius Institutes by the United States, the Ministry of foreign affairs of China has repeatedly said that all Confucius Institutes in the United States are voluntarily applied for by American universities, and Sino US universities are established in cooperation on the principle of “mutual respect, friendly consultation, equality and mutual benefit”. The daily operation and management of all these Confucius Institutes are legal, compliant, open and transparent. They have made important contributions to promoting people to people exchanges between China and the United States, and have been widely praised by all parties. Individuals and institutions in the United States politicized the Confucius Institute, a normal Sino US educational exchange project, without any basis, showing typical cold war thinking.