A renowned American institution has detained and threatened to expel an Indian researcher who had a valid visa on suspicion of having Hamas connections, according to his employer and US officials. Concerns about the questioning of research independence have been raised by the arrest of Badar Khan Suri, a postdoctoral scholar at Georgetown University in the US capital, two months into US President Donald Trump’s new term.
We don’t know he’s doing anything criminal, and we haven’t been explained why he’s being held. Politico, the first outlet to report on the issue, said that Suri, a fellow at Georgetown’s Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, was arrested Monday at his Arlington, Virginia, home.
When asked by AFP for comment, his lawyer did not immediately reply, but he told Politico that he had demanded his release. According to Department of Homeland Security spokesman Tricia McLaughlin, Suri was “a Georgetown University foreign exchange student actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting anti-Semitism on social media,” according to X. Additionally, McLaughlin charged that he had “close connections to a known or suspected terrorist, who is a senior advisor to Hamas.”
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