The Trump administration has been considering tighter background checks (see more below) for Chinese students who come to America on a visa. The case below highlights the need for those new restrictions by the Trump administration:
A Chinese student is in big trouble for taking photos of a US military installation in Florida.
The foreign national was just sentenced to a year in prison for illegal photography of the U.S. Naval Air Station Key West, Joint Interagency Task Force, South.
Zhao Qianli was sentenced to 12 months in prison, to be followed by 1 year of supervised release.
According to the court record, in September 2018, Zhao Qianli was apprehended after illegally entering JIATF-South:
Zhao entered the Joint Interagency Task Force South military property, located on Naval Air Station Key West, on September 26 without permission “by circumnavigating the installation’s primary fence line, and entering the military property from the beach.” This wasn’t a case of a tourist getting lost but the student waded in the water with his clothes on to get around a security fence on the beach.
At the time of his arrest, Zhao Qianli was observed taking photographs of military hardware.
A search warrant of Zhao Qianli’s cellular telephone and digital camera revealed photographs and video footage of the military installation.
The student was in the US on a summer program studying musicology.
TRUMP MOVES TO CURB THEFT OF NATIONAL SECURITY SECRETS:
In June of last year, the State Department shortened the length of visas for Chinese graduate students. Officials said the goal was to curb the theft of intellectual property dealing with national security.
The Trump administration is also considering vetting social media accounts of students before they come to the U.S. to study.
The phone records and social media accounts would be closely vetted to make sure the purpose of coming to the US isn’t espionage.
Spying and cyber theft have become big problems in recent years as enrolment goes up for Chinese students:
The big question is why they haven’t dealt with this issue before now. Leave it to President Trump’s administration to get busy on this important mission.
