Trump attack on Harvard reverberates across world

The Trump administration's sudden move to bar foreign students at Harvard University is seen as dealing a blow to the US's standing in business — and handing an advantage to elite rival colleges across the English-speaking world.

- Press Trust of India

WASHINGTON: The Trump administration's sudden move to bar foreign students at Harvard University is seen as dealing a blow to the US's standing in business — and handing an advantage to elite rival colleges across the English-speaking world.

"I was shocked," said Zheng Fang, a 1996 graduate of Harvard Business School whose Keywise Capital Management oversees about $2.5 billion in investments from Hong Kong.

The decision "will not only jeopardize Harvard's academic strength, but also hurt US competitiveness," he added. As part of an intensifying fight between the administration and college, the US revoked Harvard's Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, meaning foreign students can no longer attend.

Harvard, which has educated scores of global leaders from finance to business, has already seen cuts to its federal funding as part of the tussle with Trump.

Warnings that the US is undercutting a crown jewel of its education system and economic dominance hit particularly hard in Asia, a region that provides the biggest share of foreign students to the nearly 400-year-old university.