'Craven cowardice': UNSW condemned for deleting posts critical of Beijing
Federal MPs have condemned the University of NSW for deleting social media posts about human rights in Hong Kong following an online backlash from Chinese nationalists.
The university faced a barrage of pro-China criticism over the weekend after publishing an article that expressed concern about Beijing's crackdown in Hong Kong. A post on Twitter sharing the link was subsequently removed by the university.
Liberal senator James Paterson criticised the university's actions, accusing the institution of valuing its revenue from Chinese students over academic freedom.
"This craven behaviour by UNSW is yet more evidence of the compromised relationship many of our universities have with communist China," he said.
Academic freedom and free speech on campus are core values of any self-respecting higher education institution and they should never be sacrificed for lucrative international student income."
The article, based on comments from Human Rights Watch Australia director and UNSW adjunct lecturer Elaine Pearson, was also temporarily unavailable on Saturday morning at its original location on the university website's general news section. It then became accessible in the business and law section and was labelled as opinion.
The original tweet posting the article had quoted Ms Pearson saying "now is a pivotal moment to bring attention to the rapidly deteriorating situation in Hong Kong".
The university was then hit with critical social media posts and emails from Chinese nationals that said Ms Pearson's article was ignorant, biased, discriminatory, had "severely offended" Chinese students, and amounted to interference in China's internal affairs.
Responding to the initial blowback, the university added a second tweet saying the "opinions expressed by our academics do not always represent the views of UNSW". The tweet said the university had a "long and valued relationship with Greater China" and provided a welcome and inclusive environment.
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