Students, Faculty Still Trapped in China : Parents, CSUN Say U.S. Isn’t Helping

Cal State Northridge student Joo Hong Kim left the home of a Chinese family where he was hiding and rode a borrowed bicycle more than two miles through a Beijing suburb to telephone his worried parents.

Two more CSUN students, Mike Martin and Sophia Sun, stayed locked in their Beijing hotel room Thursday, awaiting assurances that U.S. Embassy personnel would escort them safely to the airport.

While local students trapped in China tried to cope as best they could, parents of some students joined university officials in complaining that the U.S. State Department has so far done little to help Americans leave the embattled country.

Cal State Northridge officials told a press conference Thursday that they are pushing as hard as they can to get government help in retrieving nine faculty members and 15 students remaining in at least three Chinese cities. The university has so far accounted for all but one faculty member and three students.

‘Extremely Concerned’

“We’ve not received any reports of harm to any faculty or students, but we’re extremely concerned because we’re not sure who is running the government and because of the large presence of military troops,” said James W. Cleary, university president.

As of Thursday afternoon, 13 Cal State Northridge students and faculty members had managed to leave China, many cutting short planned tours and academic exchange programs.

In addition to five students in Beijing, Cleary said, he is especially worried about seven social science faculty members and three students who are trying to leave the city of Xian, which is about 600 miles south of Beijing. Ralph Vicero, head of the faculty delegation, told Cleary by telephone Wednesday that “the situation is deteriorating” in the city where the group was attending a conference at the Foreign Language Institute.

“Vicero said that Americans in Xian have some serious concerns,” Cleary said.

Cleary said he has secured the help of Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) and Rep. Howard Berman (D-Panorama City) in finding transportation for the group from Xian to Hong Kong.

Berman, who has arranged for a flight that is hoped will retrieve five students from Shanghai on Saturday, criticized the State Department.

“It was an intolerable situation,” he said. “The consul in Shanghai was not helping them to get out. They had problems getting any assistance at all.”

Staff members said Berman used surplus campaign funds to purchase eight tickets on a flight to Hong Kong for CSUN students Joanne Nesti of Reseda, Rose Brown of Northridge, Dan Entous of Encino and Chris Bush and Jeannie Chott. The group earlier had planned to try to reach Hong Kong by boat and train.

Tense Wait Continues

But for many parents of students still in China, the tense wait continues.

Sue Martin said she has been calling the State Department hot line three or four times a day all week trying to get word about her 23-year-old son, Mike, and his girlfriend, Sophia. Martin said she did not learn from State Department officials until Thursday that they are at a Beijing hotel and may be able to leave China on a charter flight this morning.

“The plans are to have him evacuated, but there is no way to find out if they are going to be on the flight until it is boarded,” Martin said.

University officials said they were told that escorts would be provided to help students reach the airport.

Kim told his parents Monday in a 20-minute telephone conversation that he is hiding with a Chinese friend’s family in a residential area several miles from the center of Beijing, his sister Kathy Kim said Thursday.

Kim “risked his life bicycling 2 1/2 hours to get to a place where he could make a phone call,” Kathy Kim said.

Stayed in Dormitory

Kim said he had been staying at a university dormitory until he heard rumors that the school would be attacked by the army, Kim’s sister said.

Kim told his parents he felt it would be safer to wait out the turmoil rather than attempt to leave the country, particularly since as a Korean-American he might be mistaken for a Chinese student, Kathy Kim said.

Mark Christoffersen, who left Beijing on Monday and arrived in the United States Thursday, said three of the other program participants--Jennifer Burns, Brenda Cornelison and Gabrielle Benetiz--left Beijing before the violence broke out to go to inner Mongolia. Christoffersen said he assumes that if the three are aware of trouble in the capital, they will try to leave the country rather than return to the Beijing.

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