Allowing Confucius Institutes to operate within UK higher education institutions is “ill advised” because they are an “explicit tool of Chinese influence” on campus life, a university president has told MPs.
Appearing before the House of Commons’ Foreign Affairs Committee, Sir Anthony Finkelstein, president of City, University of London, said he welcomed moves to end the operation of the China-funded learning centres which operate on 30 UK campuses, as well as across the US and Europe.
The centres have been accused of being Trojan horses for spreading Communist Party influence and monitoring Chinese students abroad, with Rishi Sunak promising to close the institutes in July during his leadership run-off against Liz Truss. In November, security minister Tom Tugendhat confirmed that the government “will be looking to close Confucius Institutes in the UK”, stating that the centres “pose a threat to civil liberties in many universities in the United Kingdom”.
Addressing MPs on 28 February, Sir Anthony, who was the government’s chief scientific adviser for national security before moving to City in July 2021, said: “If we saw a rapid move away from [Confucius Institutes] that would be a good thing.”
