Mao Ning, spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, speaks at a regular press conference in Beijing, China, on March 8, 2024. (PHOTO / FOREIGN MINISTRY, CHINA)

BEIJING – China urges the United States to stop harassing Chinese students traveling to the country under the pretext of national security, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

For some time, the US, out of political purposes, has been frequently harassing, interrogating, and deporting Chinese students without just cause, ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a daily news briefing.

According to reports, another Chinese student when entering the US border at the San Francisco International Airport was taken to a dark room for interrogation and detained for over 20 hours by US border control staff. 

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Several law enforcement personnel interrogated the student in turn for 12 hours. The student's visa was revoked and the student was banned from entering the US and repatriated to China.

China will take resolute measures to safeguard legitimate and lawful rights and interests of Chinese citizens.

Mao Ning, spokesperson, Foreign Ministry, China

Recent incidents time and again show that the acts by the US far exceed the scope of normal law enforcement with strong ideological bias, Mao said.

Washington’s moves seriously infringe on legitimate and lawful rights and interests of persons concerned, disturb normal cross-border travel between China and the US and go against the common understandings reached by the two presidents on enhancing and facilitating China-US cultural and people-to-people exchanges, she said.

"China strongly deplores and firmly opposes this and has made solemn démarches to the United States," she said.

The US always portrays itself as open and a place for freedom and claims to be emphasizing Sino-US cultural and people-to-people exchanges and welcoming Chinese students to study in the US, Mao said.

In fact, the US keeps overstretching the concept of national security and takes selective, discriminatory and politically motivated law enforcement actions against Chinese students, she added.

"It is essentially driven by the Cold War mentality held by certain people in the United States.”

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Mao urged the US to stop harassing Chinese students traveling to the US under the pretext of national security, stop poisoning the environment of public support for China-US relations, and stop obstructing friendly interactions between the two peoples.

"China will take resolute measures to safeguard legitimate and lawful rights and interests of Chinese citizens," she added.