|
 The professor, Guojie Zhang, is also employed by Shenzhen-based
genomics giant BGI Group, which funds dozens of researchers at the
university and has its European headquarters on the university's
campus.
Zhang and a student he was supervising worked with a People's
Liberation Army (PLA) laboratory on research exposing monkeys to
extreme altitude to study their brains and develop new drugs to
prevent brain damage – a priority the PLA has identified for Chinese
troops operating on high plateau
http://eng.mod.gov.cn/
news/2021-02/09/content_4878887.htm borders.
Zhang co-published that paper
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/
articles/
PMC6956719 with a PLA major general in January 2020. At the time the
study was published, the university was "not familiar with the fact
that the paper also included authors from Chinese military research
institutions," Niels Kroer, head of its biology department, told
Reuters in an email.
Zhang confirmed that he did not inform the university of the link
because the university didn't require researchers to report
co-authors on scientific papers to it, which the university
confirmed. BGI said the study with the PLA lab "was not carried out
for military purposes" and brain research is a critical area for
understanding human diseases. China's government science academy
said
http://www.kiz.ac.cn/gre/gre7/
gre73/201912/t20191223_5467586.html the study had national defence
and civilian benefits on the Tibetan plateau.
Concerns about China's fusion of military and civilian technology,
and about universities transferring sensitive technology to China
that could help its military, have grown in the United States in
recent years. Washington agreed
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/09/29/
u-s-eu-trade-and-technology-council-inaugural-joint-statement last
month to work with the European Union on the issue under a new joint
technology and trade council. A U.S. Department of Defense report on
China's military power this month flagged concern over Beijing using
biotechnology to enhance its soldiers' performance.
The Danish incident, reported here for the first time, shows how
China's pursuit of biotechnology with a military use has also become
an issue for universities in Europe.
The European Commission says it is developing guidelines on
"tackling foreign interference" at higher education institutions; a
2020 report https://leidenasiacentre.nl/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Towards-Sustainable-Europe-China-Collaboration-in-Higher-Education-and-Research.pdf
from the Leiden Asia Centre, an independent group affiliated with
Leiden University in the Netherlands, found at least five countries
in Europe had concerns about the risks of research collaboration
with China. Some universities, including Copenhagen, have long had
close science ties to China.
Copenhagen university and two large Danish foundations who funded
some of Zhang's work said they discovered China's military was
involved only after one of the foundations saw it had been credited,
incorrectly, with financing the monkey study. The work was funded by
the Chinese government and military, the paper said.
The discovery came as Denmark's intelligence agency, PET, warned
https://ufm.dk/en/publications/2021/files/
er-din-forskning-i-fare-en.pdf Danish universities in May of the
national security risks of being unwittingly involved in foreign
military research, citing "a number of espionage activities and
other foreign interference," and a student who co-authored research
into 5G technology with an engineer from a Chinese military
university. It declined to comment on specific cases.
The Chinese Academy of Science, where Zhang also has a genetics lab,
said
http://www.kiz.ac.cn/gre/gre7/
gre73/201912/t20191223_5467586.html of the study at the time that
brain damage and death caused by high altitude on the Tibetan
plateau had severely hindered "national defence construction."
Denmark's Ministry of Higher Education and Science declined to
comment on the altitude study, but said export control rules apply
to some technology that can be used for both civilian and military
purposes. The Danish Business Authority said most types of gene
technology are not on its export control list.
The ministry said it had launched a broad review of the risks of
international research cooperation, led by top university heads, to
conclude at the start of next year.
The University of Copenhagen expects the review of "ethical and
security policy limits" for collaboration will result in new rules
for universities - and greater focus on the risks, its deputy
director for research and innovation Kim Brinckmann told Reuters in
an email.
"We are very proud to have Prof. Zhang ... as one of our very highly
performing researchers," he said. The university did not respond to
a question about how much funding BGI provides it.
China's foreign ministry said it urged Danish institutions to
"abandon ideological prejudice and end groundless accusations and
smears," and treat their research cooperation rationally "to accrue
positive energy in the development of bilateral relations and
practical cooperation."
ALTITUDE
Zhang and the head of the PLA laboratory for high-altitude research,
Major General Yuqi Gao, designed the study, which also lists BGI
founders Wang Jian and Yang Huanming as co-authors. BGI's other
joint research with Gao has involved soldiers in Tibet and Xinjiang,
Reuters reported in January.
That report was cited by two U.S. senators who called in September
for BGI to be sanctioned by the United States as a military-linked
company. Gao's research has directly improved the ability of China's
rapid-advance plateau troops to carry out training and combat
missions, according to the Chinese military's official news service
http://www.81.cn/
zghjy/2015-12/11/content_6811003.htm.
[to top of second column] |
 China's Academy of Military
Medical Sciences launched a four-year plan in
2012 for troops to acclimatise and adapt to the
low-oxygen Tibetan plateau. That plan said BGI
was working with Gao's lab to test soldiers
arriving in Tibet and identify genes linked to
altitude sickness, which does not affect
Tibetans. It said preventing altitude sickness
helped to "manage border areas where ethnic
minorities gather," and had far-reaching
economic and political significance.
BGI told Reuters the research with the military
university aimed to understand the health risk
for all people travelling to and working at high
altitude. "The project using
BGI's technology studied the changes of the pathophysiology and
genomics of the human body at very high altitudes," a BGI spokesman
said. "In China, many military institutions ... carry out both
civilian and military research," he added.
Gao wrote
https://mmrjournal.biomedcentral.com/
articles/
10.1186/s40779-018-0150-0#author-information in 2018 that high
altitude disease "is the main reason for reduced combat
effectiveness and health damage of soldiers at high altitudes and
influences the results of war on the highland plateau," and noted
that drugs could be used in an emergency for the rapid deployment of
soldiers.
China's military has recently increased http://www.mod.gov.cn/v/2021-11/01/content_4898183.htm
live fire drills in Tibet after border clashes with India.
DEEP TIES
The University of Copenhagen has one of Europe's oldest genetics
institutes, and it is BGI's biggest international research partner
by count of science papers.
The ties run deep. Two former BGI chief executives, BGI's chairman,
and the founder of its animal cloning programme previously studied
or worked at Copenhagen. The university hosts more than two dozen
BGI-funded researchers undertaking science and health doctorates.
Biology head Kroer told Reuters the university had been unaware of
"claims that BGI has connections with the PLA." The university said
that other than Zhang's salary as a professor, no Danish money was
spent on the study, which animal rights activists have argued
https://actionforprimates.org/public/
afp_take_action_2020.php subjected the animals to suffering and
distress. The student Zhang worked with was in China
and employed by BGI, the university said. Zhang's research team was
not involved in the animal experiments performed in China, but did
analyse the genomic data generated from the experiments, it added.
The Lundbeck Foundation, which primarily funds brain research and
was incorrectly listed as a funder of the monkey brain study, "has
not supported this area of his research, nor do we have any
knowledge about it," a spokesman said of the monkey brain project.
Lundbeck said Zhang had told them he was studying ants and genetics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2P3WGVZgJs and how this could
explain brain processes in humans.
The foundation said it asked Zhang this year to remove its name from
the study. The Carlsberg Foundation, which controls the world's
third-largest brewer and said it gave Zhang a DKK 4 million
($623,000) fellowship in 2016, also told Reuters it had been
incorrectly listed as funding the project. The paper
was published in a Chinese journal, Zoological Research, which
declined to comment.
Zhang is on the journal's editorial board. He told Reuters the two
Danish foundations were mentioned in the paper by mistake. "We did
not spend any funding from the grants I received from these two
foundations on this project," he added in an email. The journal
published a correction removing the foundations' names in March
2021.
Lundbeck declined to comment on what impact the discovery might
have; Carlsberg has said animal experiments conducted overseas must
comply with Danish regulations, but did not comment on the military
involvement.
INTERNAL DEBATE
In June 2020, the University of Copenhagen decided to close a think
tank it had run with Shanghai's Fudan University since 2013, saying
it had adjusted its overall cooperation strategy.
The decision prompted a debate about China inside the university,
documents obtained by Reuters under freedom of information rules
show. The university held a meeting in August 2020 to discuss the
closure of Fudan and review its collaboration with China.
"China has engaged in a strategic civil-military fusion of research
that often blurs the lines to the outsider," China Studies professor
Jorgen Delman said in a note to the university's head afterwards,
recommending better screening of Chinese researchers and
consultations with Danish military intelligence to advise on "risks
and no-go areas." He declined to comment further.
Genetic cloning technology was transferred to BGI after a
researcher, Yutao Du, received her doctorate in 2007 with a team
from Danish universities that created the world's first pigs using a
technique called handmade cloning. She was praised by the Chinese
government for bringing the technology to China, which went on to
clone genetically modified pigs for the study of human neurological
illnesses.
China's national science programme said cloned pigs were a stepping
stone to chimeras, a controversial area where China wanted to lead
the world. Chimeras are organisms composed of cells from two or more
species that may be capable of growing organs for human
transplantation.
Du is now vice president at BGI Genomics Ltd, and won promotion
within the Chinese Communist Party, becoming a delegate to its
national congress in 2017. She did not respond to a request for
comment.
(Kirsty Needham reported from Sydney, Stine Jacobsen from
Copenhagen; Edited by Sara Ledwith)
[© 2021 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2021 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content |
