Why was a US Yale graduate hounded out of his job promoting Chinese culture?

In just two months, Yale graduate Edward Kuperman went from being praised by Chinese state media to being bombarded by public accusations that he was a spy.
It began with a June 18 article from state news agency Xinhua, in which he was described as an eager 24-year-old sinophile who made the unconventional choice of spurning China’s eastern metropolises to live in Dunhuang, an oasis in the country’s northwestern Gansu province.
His interest in China started with a Chinese language class in...