China's Education Minister Warns Universities: Don't Promote Western Values

China's education minister has told universities to keep away from textbooks that promote Western values.

Yuan Guiren said during a recent educational forum that universities "should maintain political integrity and keep criticism of China's leaders or political system out of the classroom," BBC wrote, based on a report by Xinhua news agency.

China's Communist Party has long criticized Western values such as multi-party democracy and universal human rights.

Under President Xi Jinping's administration, control over the media, political dissenters, and the Internet has become more stringent.

"(We must) strengthen effective management of Western original classroom materials and we must not allow materials into our classrooms that spread Western values," Yuan was quoted as saying. "Never allow attacks upon or defamation of Party leaders, or remarks that discredit socialism in university classrooms."

In late December, Xi urged universities to have greater "ideological guidance" and encouraged the study of Marxism.

Prominent members of the academe have been accused by Party journal Qiushi of promoting Western values.

In the same month, law professor Zhang Xuehong said he was sacked by the East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai as he refused to issue an apology over articles he authored which lambaste the government, the BBC said.

Earlier, economist and free speech advocate Xia Yeliang, a signatory to a document called Charter 08 which called for democratic reforms, was expelled from Beijing University.

Uighur academic Ilham Tohti --who had urged better dialogue between Beijing and the Uighur minority in Xinjiang -- was jailed for life for separatism last year. Several of his students were also jailed.

According to Celia Hatton of BBC News in Beijing, books promoting Western values are not really prohibited.

"The Chinese authorities have not officially banned textbooks promoting 'Western values.' Instead, the minister's comments can be seen as a red-light warning to Chinese academics. They signal the intention by President Xi Jinping's government to continue tightening control over traditional sources of dissent, including Chinese university campuses," she said.

"Those working in the arts, academia and China's non-profit sector are subject to continual reminders of their fragile existence. High-profile cases of outspoken university professors, activists and artists who have been sacked or imprisoned feature regularly in the state media."

"It is possible an outright ban on certain textbooks might follow, but Mr. Yuan's comments have already served one purpose for the Party: academics, and others, consider yourselves warned."