美国国家公共电台 NPR The Fine Line Between Countering Security Threats And Racial Profiling

The Fine Line Between Countering Security Threats And Racial Profiling

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

In a Tennessee courtroom today, a high-stakes bail¹ hearing will take place. It's a case involving China and alleged² nuclear espionage³. Allen Ho has been jailed since April. He's charged with violating the Atomic Energy Act. His case is one of a number involving scientists who the U.S. government suspects may also be spies. The scientists in question are all U.S. citizens, though they were all born in mainland China or Taiwan.

NPR's Mary Louise Kelly is with us here now. Good morning.

MARY LOUISE KELLY, BYLINE⁴: Good morning, Renee.

MONTAGNE: And what exactly is Allen Ho charged with?

KELLY: So Ho is a nuclear engineer and consultant⁵. And the charges against him, in essence, are that he helped China's biggest nuclear power company to develop sensitive nuclear technology. He's also charged with conspiracy⁶ to act as an agent of a foreign government, in this case China. And the allegation is that in doing these things, he put U.S. national security at risk.

These are serious charges, Renee. They carry a maximum of a possible life sentence.

MONTAGNE: And Allen Ho, he's denied these charges?

KELLY: He does. Again, he's been in jail, so I wasn't able to speak to him. But I did interview his attorney, a man named Peter Zeidenberg, who has defended a number of these Asian-American scientists, many of whose cases have eventually been dismissed. And so Zeidenberg would not comment on the details of Ho's case, but he would say across the cases he's been involved with, he sees a pattern of people targeted because of their ties to China.

Here's what he said.

PETER ZEIDENBERG: If their ties were to France or their ties were to Italy or to Scandinavia, their conduct would never come under the radar⁷ of the department. It's a bright red flag.

KELLY: You heard him talking there under the radar of the department, and what he means is, of course, the Justice Department, which is prosecuting⁸ these cases. And that's worth noting. Zeidenberg, who's now with a big D.C. law firm Arent Fox, but he was a longtime federal prosecutor⁹. And he told me he thinks his former colleagues are overreaching.

ZEIDENBERG: They have been way too quick to pull the trigger on these cases and others. And they see conspiracies¹⁰ and patterns and malevolent¹¹ conduct when there isn't any.

MONTAGNE: Talk to us, Mary Louise, about some of these cases involving scientists accused of spying. Several have made the news in the last few months.

KELLY: There certainly have. There's the case people may remember of Sherry Chen, a Chinese-American. She was accused of illegally accessing federal dam databases. She was cleared of all charges, but she lost her job with the National Weather Service. She's still fighting to get it back. Another case that I want to bring to your attention, this is the case of Xiaoxing Xi.

Professor Xi has quite a story. He is Chinese-American, again. He is a U.S. citizen, again. He's a physics professor at Temple University. And last year, one morning in May, he was at his home, which is in Philadelphia. And he told me he heard a knock at the door.

XIAOXING XI: So I run to the door to open it and saw a lot of people outside of the house. And some were armed and some had the battering¹² ram¹³ ready to take down the door.

KELLY: A battering ram ready to take down your door.

XI: Yeah, and so an FBI agent showed his badge and asked me are you Xiaoxing Xi? I said, yes. And then he announced that I was arrested. And another agent just put the handcuffs on me.

KELLY: What did they say you were being arrested for?

XI: I asked them, but they wouldn't tell me. They said, we'll tell you after you answer some questions at the headquarters.

KELLY: And, Renee, Professor Xi says his wife and daughters were home, one of whom was just 12 at the time. They were marched out of their bedrooms at gunpoint. And Professor Xi was taken in for questions, as you heard there. He was fingerprinted¹⁴, had his mug shot taken.

MONTAGNE: And in the end, what was Professor Xi charged with?

KELLY: Well, what he was formally charged with was wire fraud. When you read through the indictment¹⁵, what becomes clear is that the FBI became convinced he was passing high tech secrets, secrets with a military application, to China. Now, Professor Xi denies that. And four months later, all charges were dropped. But I asked him about it point blank. Here's our exchange.

Were you spying for China?

XI: No, no, never. Of course, I collaborate¹⁶ with people in China. But that's what the government and the universities encourage us to do.

KELLY: You understand, I assume, that economic espionage by China is a big national security threat and that the FBI's job is to counter it.

XI: Absolutely. I wish they catch more people who are actually doing the spying. These kind of cases literally¹⁷ terrorize the Asian-American community and scientific community.

MONTAGNE: And, Mary Louise, those are strong words. Those are pretty tough accusations¹⁸.

KELLY: They are.

MONTAGNE: What is the backdrop? Why are we seeing a rise in cases like the ones you've been telling us about?

KELLY: Well, I think the backdrop is that economic espionage by China does cost the U.S. economy billions every year. There's no question, no dispute that China is interested in acquiring intellectual property, classified data that belongs to the U.S. government and to American companies. And we should note, there have been many successful prosecutions¹⁹.

The FBI in order to raise awareness²⁰ about this whole problem actually launched a big campaign last summer. Part of it was a movie that they made. Let me let you listen to this one part of it.

(SOUNDBITE OF VIDEO)

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) Special Agent Carpenter (ph).

KELLY: So that's a dramatization, but it's based on a true story. And it's about a Chinese company that was trying to steal trade secrets from a U.S. competitor.

MONTAGNE: Now, the FBI and the Justice Department, how do they respond to concerns that in their zeal²¹ to uncover Chinese spies, Chinese-Americans are being unfairly targeted?

KELLY: They say absolutely not the case. The FBI declined our request for an interview. But they did give us a statement. Let me read part of that to you now. It says (reading) while we cannot comment on specific cases, the FBI follows the facts wherever they lead. It goes on, quote, "we investigate individuals based on known or suspected criminal activities or threats to national security. The FBI does not initiate²² investigations²³ based on an individual's race, ethnicity, national origin or religion."

To circle back to where we began, this hearing that's unfolding today in a courtroom in Knoxville. And I expect, Renee, we have not seen the last of these high-profile prosecutions because the FBI and the DOJ are still trying to figure out how do you counter a legitimate²⁴ national security threat without discriminating²⁵ on racial grounds?

MONTAGNE: That's NPR's national security correspondent Mary Louise Kelly. Thanks very much.

KELLY: You're welcome.

1 bail   

v.舀（水），保释；n.保证金，保释，保释人

参考例句：

• One of the prisoner's friends offered to bail him out.犯人的一个朋友答应保释他出来。
• She has been granted conditional bail.她被准予有条件保释。

2 alleged   

a.被指控的，嫌疑的

参考例句：

• It was alleged that he had taken bribes while in office. 他被指称在任时收受贿赂。
• alleged irregularities in the election campaign 被指称竞选运动中的不正当行为

3 espionage   

n.间谍行为，谍报活动

参考例句：

• The authorities have arrested several people suspected of espionage.官方已经逮捕了几个涉嫌从事间谍活动的人。
• Neither was there any hint of espionage in Hanley's early life.汉利的早期生活也毫无进行间谍活动的迹象。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 consultant   

n.顾问；会诊医师，专科医生

参考例句：

• He is a consultant on law affairs to the mayor.他是市长的一个法律顾问。
• Originally,Gar had agreed to come up as a consultant.原来，加尔只答应来充当我们的顾问。

6 conspiracy   

n.阴谋，密谋，共谋

参考例句：

• The men were found guilty of conspiracy to murder.这些人被裁决犯有阴谋杀人罪。
• He claimed that it was all a conspiracy against him.他声称这一切都是一场针对他的阴谋。

7 radar   

n.雷达，无线电探测器

参考例句：

• They are following the flight of an aircraft by radar.他们正在用雷达追踪一架飞机的飞行。
• Enemy ships were detected on the radar.敌舰的影像已显现在雷达上。

8 prosecuting   

检举、告发某人( prosecute的现在分词 )； 对某人提起公诉； 继续从事（某事物）； 担任控方律师

参考例句：

• The witness was cross-examined by the prosecuting counsel. 证人接受控方律师的盘问。
• Every point made by the prosecuting attorney was telling. 检查官提出的每一点都是有力的。

9 prosecutor   

n.起诉人；检察官，公诉人

参考例句：

• The defender argued down the prosecutor at the court.辩护人在法庭上驳倒了起诉人。
• The prosecutor would tear your testimony to pieces.检查官会把你的证言驳得体无完肤。

10 conspiracies   

n.阴谋，密谋( conspiracy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• He was still alive and hatching his conspiracies. 他还活着，策划着阴谋诡计。 来自辞典例句
• It appeared that they had engaged in fresh conspiracies from the very moment of their release. 看上去他们刚给释放，立刻开始新一轮的阴谋活动。 来自英汉文学

11 malevolent   

adj.有恶意的，恶毒的

参考例句：

• Why are they so malevolent to me?他们为什么对我如此恶毒？
• We must thwart his malevolent schemes.我们决不能让他的恶毒阴谋得逞。

12 battering   

n.用坏，损坏v.连续猛击( batter的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• The film took a battering from critics in the US. 该影片在美国遭遇到批评家的猛烈抨击。
• He kept battering away at the door. 他接连不断地砸门。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 ram   

(random access memory)随机存取存储器

参考例句：

• 512k RAM is recommended and 640k RAM is preferred.推荐配置为512K内存，640K内存则更佳。

14 fingerprinted   

v.指纹( fingerprint的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The criminal was fingerprinted in the sheriff's office. 罪犯在警长办公室里被取下指纹。 来自辞典例句
• They were then taken to be photographed and fingerprinted. 然后，他们被带去照相、留指纹。 来自互联网

15 indictment   

n.起诉；诉状

参考例句：

• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。
• They issued an indictment against them.他们起诉了他们。

16 collaborate   

vi.协作，合作；协调

参考例句：

• The work gets done more quickly when we collaborate.我们一旦合作，工作做起来就更快了。
• I would ask you to collaborate with us in this work.我们愿意请你们在这项工作中和我们合作。

17 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

18 accusations   

n.指责( accusation的名词复数 )；指控；控告；（被告发、控告的）罪名

参考例句：

• There were accusations of plagiarism. 曾有过关于剽窃的指控。
• He remained unruffled by their accusations. 对于他们的指控他处之泰然。

19 prosecutions   

起诉( prosecution的名词复数 )； 原告； 实施； 从事

参考例句：

• It is the duty of the Attorney-General to institute prosecutions. 检察总长负责提起公诉。
• Since World War II, the government has been active in its antitrust prosecutions. 第二次世界大战以来，政府积极地进行着反对托拉斯的检举活动。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件

20 awareness   

n.意识，觉悟，懂事，明智

参考例句：

• There is a general awareness that smoking is harmful.人们普遍认识到吸烟有害健康。
• Environmental awareness has increased over the years.这些年来人们的环境意识增强了。

21 zeal   

n.热心，热情，热忱

参考例句：

• Revolutionary zeal caught them up,and they joined the army.革命热情激励他们，于是他们从军了。
• They worked with great zeal to finish the project.他们热情高涨地工作，以期完成这个项目。

22 initiate   

vt.开始，创始，发动；启蒙，使入门；引入

参考例句：

• A language teacher should initiate pupils into the elements of grammar.语言老师应该把基本语法教给学生。
• They wanted to initiate a discussion on economics.他们想启动一次经济学讨论。

23 investigations   

（正式的）调查( investigation的名词复数 )； 侦查； 科学研究； 学术研究

参考例句：

• His investigations were intensive and thorough but revealed nothing. 他进行了深入彻底的调查，但没有发现什么。
• He often sent them out to make investigations. 他常常派他们出去作调查。

24 legitimate   

adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法

参考例句：

• Sickness is a legitimate reason for asking for leave.生病是请假的一个正当的理由。
• That's a perfectly legitimate fear.怀有这种恐惧完全在情理之中。

25 discriminating   

a.有辨别能力的

参考例句：

• Due caution should be exercised in discriminating between the two. 在区别这两者时应该相当谨慎。
• Many businesses are accused of discriminating against women. 许多企业被控有歧视妇女的做法。