The United States Department of Defense has designated Chinese-funded cultural centres known as Confucius Institutes at American universities as a threat to national security, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has said.
In a video posted on social media on Friday, October 23, Hegseth alleged that the institutes had been operating under different names and disguises across US universities.
He said the Pentagon had added the organisations to its list of institutions considered threats to American national security.
According to Hegseth, about 80 new organisations had emerged across 30 universities, operating under different names and charters but allegedly pursuing the same objectives.
“It turns out that 80 new propaganda cells across 30 universities had popped up using different names and different charters, but with the same mission: to steal intellectual property and to infiltrate the minds of American students,” he said.
Hegseth added that the Defence Department had spent the past two months systematically dismantling the organisations.
Washington has long accused Confucius Institutes of serving as tools of Chinese propaganda and has previously taken steps to restrict their operations in the United States.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington had not immediately responded to a request for comment as of the time of the report.
