Followup on the Lieber/Harvard/Thousand Talents matter

In a 18-19 Feb 2020 post titled US sets sights on Harvard professor and universities over Chinese funding amid heightened fear of IP leaks . Mark Magnier works through some of the issues in the Lieber/[Chinese] Thousand Talents affair.

Of the escalation to a scientist of the stature of Charles Lieber, Kei Koizumi, a science consultant and White House science and technology adviser in the Obama administration, is quoted:

“This wake-up call is far louder because of who this person is, his ethnicity and the institution for which he works. Now it affects everyone, not just Chinese or other Asians like myself."

Andrew Lelling, US attorney for the District of Massachusetts is quoted: “You can take money from the Chinese. But you can’t lie about it. If you lie, and it’s in the NIH grant-making process, it’s a crime.”

To date, the crime charged seems to be that of lying to a federal agency, rather than Espionage under the Economic Espionage Act. The Magnier article states:


[Lieber] has been charged with one felony count of making false statements to US government agencies and faces up to five years in prison and a maximum fine of US$250,000.



Also within the Magnier article:



Zeidenberg, Xi and others say most cases can be handled without public shaming and harsh prosecutions. A prestigious National Science Foundation study released in December concurs, finding that many foreign influence issues “can be addressed within the framework of research integrity” without walling off core areas of science.
The NIH acknowledged in an email that funding applications can be burdensome but denied that the US punishes researchers for “honest mistakes”.
“When a grant application misrepresents, fabricates or falsifies information or data, it could be considered a serious violation,” it added.



Elsewhere, a comment to a post in the Harvard Crimson titled In Wake of Lieber Arrest, Dean of Science Says FAS ‘Limited’ In Its Ability to Track Unauthorized Research Activity contains the text:



Details of Lieber’s alleged offences appear in a charging document submitted by the FBI in connection with his arrest. It says that for periods of time between 2012 and 2017, Lieber agreed to be paid a salary of $50,000 per month, as well as about $150,000 a year in personal and living expenses, by WUT, and was given more than $1.5 million to set up a research lab there. According to a contract cited in the document, Lieber was to work at or for WUT for at least nine months a year. Lieber also agreed to host visiting scientists for two-month stints at his US lab, according to the FBI, an agreement that Harvard was not aware of.

At the same time, Lieber continued his tenure at Harvard University and applied for funding from US agencies, receiving at least $15 million in federal grants from the Department of Defense (DOD) and the NIH since 2008. NIH policies require that researchers applying for federal funds disclose any funding they receive from other governments or universities outside the United States. Lieber was asked about his participation in the Thousand Talents Plan in April 2018 by DOD investigators, and by Harvard in late 2018 in response to an enquiry from the NIH. In both instances, the FBI says, he denied being part of it.



These facts seem to be consistent with a 3 February 2020 post in Nature



Details of Lieber’s alleged offences appear in a charging document submitted by the FBI in connection with his arrest. It says that for periods of time between 2012 and 2017, Lieber agreed to be paid a salary of $50,000 per month, as well as about $150,000 a year in personal and living expenses, by WUT, and was given more than $1.5 million to set up a research lab there. According to a contract cited in the document, Lieber was to work at or for WUT for at least nine months a year. Lieber also agreed to host visiting scientists for two-month stints at his US lab, according to the FBI, an agreement that Harvard was not aware of.

At the same time, Lieber continued his tenure at Harvard University and applied for funding from US agencies, receiving at least $15 million in federal grants from the Department of Defense (DOD) and the NIH since 2008. NIH policies require that researchers applying for federal funds disclose any funding they receive from other governments or universities outside the United States. Lieber was asked about his participation in the Thousand Talents Plan in April 2018 by DOD investigators, and by Harvard in late 2018 in response to an enquiry from the NIH. In both instances, the FBI says, he denied being part of it.





link: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00291-2

**UPDATE. 5 March 2020, from the Harvard Crimson:



On Feb. 11, the U.S. Department of Education launched an investigation into Harvard over its foreign funding from the governments of China, Iran, Russia, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia.

Bacow said Monday that Harvard appropriately disclosed its foreign gifts, contracts, and grants “in a timely way” and in compliance with the law. He said the University is currently working on a response to the Education Department probe.

Bacow noted that there are a “variety of ways” in which Harvard safeguards its intellectual property, including filing patents and seeking judicial protections. He said the University does not conduct “classified research” and that all of the research the school does is ultimately published.



link: https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2020/3/3/bacow-lieber-funding-policies/