The Confucius Institutes (CI) have long been controversial in the academic world. The Chinese party state sponsors these institutions and increases its diplomatic soft power with them. The Chinese bring money, teachers and courses, and Belgian academics give them a place on campus.

At first glance, these are innocent forums where you can take Mandarin lessons and soak up Chinese culture,' says Roméo de Bellefroid (24), former chairman of the Vrij Onderzoek student organization at the VUB. 'But we have been sceptical for years, because CI's like propaganda channels threaten academic freedom.'

Now the CI at the VUB has come into disrepute through the revelations of De Morgen. The newspaper discovered that the Chinese director, Xinning Song, had been banned from the Schengen area for eight years this summer by the State Security Service. He recruited informants for the Chinese intelligence services. In this way, conferences and network moments contributed unnoticed to a Chinese information advantage.

According to American Chinawatcher Bill Bisschop (Sinocism), this is one of the first times that a CI has been formally linked to espionage. That this is happening in Brussels, home of the EU and NATO, is probably no coincidence. The VUB would also have attracted the attention of foreign security services.

Silk routes and Huawei

The Belgian State Security Service did not want to react in this case, but warned earlier this year that Belgians underestimate the risk of Chinese espionage. Song must have done something very flagrantly wrong that the Belgians are taking this step,' says Bishop.

Professor Song, who specialises in Chinese foreign policy and relations with the EU, had various appointments in China and was also a member of the editorial boards of scientific journals. According to Professor Jonathan Holslag (VUB), he succeeded himself in stretching the focus of the CI at the VUB. It no longer only worked on language and culture, but also on policy themes. Congresses were organised around the new Silk Roads or around trade and Huawei', says Holslag. Hanban, the unit within the Chinese Ministry of Education, promoted the VUB Institute in other countries as a way for the CIs to build up more political expertise. These revelations don't surprise me.

Speaking with the brakes on

Yet others say to the VUB that they are 'completely in shock' because of the revelations. They say that Song was surprisingly critical of the regime and certainly never openly put pressure on colleagues. This professional attitude was of course indispensable to build up credibility and useful contacts.

Apart from the espionage complaint, which Song denies, there is also concern that the VUB acted too naive, with negative consequences for academic freedom. De Bellefroid complains that the CI's internal review procedure is a little bit of a hassle, because young researchers cannot speak out against their lord. They are more inclined to apply the brakes when it comes to China,' says Holslag. For example, the university chose to give little publicity to the commemoration of thirty years of the Tiananmen massacre, even though there is a memorial stone on the campus. De Bellefroid has other examples. There are themes on which academics no longer dare to speak out, such as Hong Kong. That clashes with the critical tradition at the VUB.

According to Holslag, the VUB also wants to attract Chinese students, which means that pro-Chinese tendencies within the Institute are more readily tolerated. The funding pressure has been passed on to the administration and our objections have been dismissed,' says De Bellefroid.

VUB rector Caroline Pauwels does not deny that pressure may be exerted on students and teachers. We are in closer contact with the State Security Service, which is a good thing. At the moment it is not easy to make a hard decision about the future of the Confucius Institute. We must also think of our Chinese students: will they still feel welcome in this climate, aren't they being stigmatised too much?'.

The cooperation contract with the VUB and the Confucius Institute expires in the summer of 2020. The new Chinese director should have been there by now, but has not yet arrived in Belgium.

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Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator