TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A female Taiwanese American student has been punished by Harvard for disrupting China's US ambassador during a speech, while the Chinese student who forcibly removed her from the venue was not disciplined.
Documents shared by the House Select Committee on the CCP with the Washington Free Beacon revealed that Harvard imposed disciplinary probation on Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) in May for “inappropriate social behavior.” It did not enforce any sanctions on Zou Hongji (鄒宏基) for his actions against Wu and instead issued an apology.
When Chinese Ambassador Xie Feng (謝峰) gave a speech during the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference on April 20, Wu protested Beijing's human rights abuses by shouting slogans. Before Wu could finish her protest, Zou grabbed her by the arm and pulled her away from the venue.
Harvard's disciplinary board voted to place Wu on probation for breaching the university's rules on free speech. However, the university letter did not specify what guidelines Wu had broken.
On May 17, an administrative board subcommittee tasked with disciplining undergraduate students initially suggested Wu only be admonished as she had apologized during a board meeting for her disruption.
During the meeting, Wu said her main intent was to protect free speech by showing dissent against the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) representative. She felt this enabled the audience to think more critically about the ambassador's speech.
Wu claimed to not be aware that her actions had broken university rules and did not think her actions had prevented the ambassador from speaking. She lamented the threats against her safety and that of others resulting from her protest.
Later that day, the full board rejected the recommendation of the subcommittee and opted to issue a formal disciplinary response. In an email, the board told Wu in a letter the probation would last from May 17-20.
Harvard also placed on probation two other students who had protested the ambassador's remarks. One of the students was Tsering Yangchen, the co-president of Boston's chapter of Students for a Free Tibet, while the identity of the other student has not been publicized.
Zou was later identified as a master's candidate at Harvard's Graduate School of Education and an officer in the university's branch of the Chinese Students and Scholars Association. The group reportedly has ties to the CCP and Zou was one of the organizers of Xie's speech.
Harvard notified Zou via email that he had breached the university's policy on physical violence. However, the Harvard Graduate School of Education chose not to impose any sanctions partially because of the online backlash he had received.
Kevin Boehm, the assistant dean for student affairs at the Harvard Graduate School of Education sent a letter about Zou on May 8 to Martin West, the school's academic dean. Boehm cited Zou as claiming he did not use excessive force and that he was the victim of doxxing on social media after the incident.
On May 10, West sent an email to Boehn saying rather than refer Zou for discipline it had written a letter of censure.
West took a conciliatory tone in an email sent to Zou on May 22 saying, “I understand that your intentions were to prevent the event from being further disrupted.”
West also apologized for the online response to his actions, “I also acknowledge that you and your family have experienced significant harm as a result of the event, which I deeply regret.”
The Harvard official correspondence did not mention that Zou's actions against Wu during the speech had been reported on April 20 to the Massachusetts State Police as assault and battery.
