WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The US State Department indicated Thursday that a global suspension on visa processing for international students would be brief, as it ramps up scrutiny of applicants’ social media activity.

State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce encouraged prospective students to seek visa appointments and said: “I would not be recommending that if this was going to be weeks or months.”

“I can tell you that it’s something that would happen perhaps sooner than later,” she told reporters.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday ordered embassies and consulates to pause scheduling appointments for student visas pending new guidelines on checking applicants’ social media postings.

It is one of a series of battles waged over education by President Donald Trump’s administration, which has rescinded thousands of visas, sought to ban Harvard University from accepting any international students and vowed to aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students.

Rubio has revoked visas in large part of students who led demonstrations critical of Israel’s offensive in Gaza, as he uses an obscure law that allows the removal of people deemed to go against United States foreign policy interests.

In his cable to diplomatic missions on Tuesday, Rubio said that the new guidance on social media vetting would be issued in the “coming days”.

Bruce said that prospective students should start checking online for when appointments become available.

“Right now there might be some delay, and what I’m told to encourage people to do is to regularly check to see when those spaces open,” she said.