US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday that the United States will begin revoking visas of Chinese students, including those with ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) or studying in key fields, Reuters reported, BTA reported.
In his statement, Rubio indicated that the State Department would also review criteria for tightening controls on all future visa applicants from China and Hong Kong.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington has not yet responded to Reuters' requests for comment on the subject.
Chinese students are in second place in the number of foreign students studying at US universities in the 2023-2024 academic year. and make up 277,398 people, Reuters reports.
A US federal judge has ordered the conditional release of a Russian researcher from Harvard University who fled abroad for fear of political persecution and whom the Trump administration wants to send back to her country, Agence France-Presse reported, quoted by BTA.
Ksenia Petrova, a researcher at Harvard Medical School, was arrested by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in February at Boston airport on her way back from a trip to Paris for failing to declare biological samples she was carrying in her luggage.
The woman was notified that her visa had been cancelled and that she would be deported to Russia. She was then transferred to a detention center run by the immigration service in the state of Louisiana.
Subsequently, on May 14, Ksenia Petrova was charged with smuggling, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
Federal Judge Christina Rice of Vermont today ordered the immigration service to release Petrova pending a future decision on the validity of her visa.
“During the hearing, we determined that Ksenia is not a danger to the public, is not a flight risk, and does not warrant being held in an immigration detention center,“ her attorney, Greg Romanovsky, said in a statement.
The attorney said he was pleased to present at today's hearing “two pieces of evidence that Ksenia Petrova was not carrying anything dangerous or illegal and that customs officers at Logan International Airport "they had no right to cancel her visa or arrest her."
As a result, the Russian researcher must be returned to Boston pending a new hearing on her continued detention, this time on smuggling charges.
After her arrest, she said she feared she would be detained if she returned to Russia for her participation in political demonstrations, particularly against the invasion of Ukraine.
A US judge has said that the attempt by the administration of US President Donald Trump to deport Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil is likely unconstitutional, Reuters reported, quoted by BTA.
District Judge Michael Farbierz in Newark, New Jersey, said he would issue a corresponding decision with follow-up steps later today. Khalil is currently being held in a Louisiana immigration detention center.
Khalil was arrested on March 8 after the State Department revoked his green card, invoking a rarely used provision of U.S. immigration law that gives the secretary of state the authority to deport any noncitizen whose presence in the country is deemed to be contrary to U.S. foreign policy interests.
Judge Fabriars wrote that Khalil will likely prove his case that the provision is unconstitutional.