US adds Chinese telecom companies to national security threat list

Washington [US], March 28 (ANI): The US on Friday added China Telecom (Americans) Corp and China Mobile International USA to its list of communications equipment and service providers as posing a threat to national security under a 2019 law aimed at protecting US communications networks. The US Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau also added Russia’s AO Kaspersky Lab to its list of communications equipment and service providers deemed a threat to national security, according to Global times citing FCC’s press release.

This is for the first time that US has included a Russian entity to a list dominated by Chinese telecommunications firms Last year, in March, the US regulator added five Chinese companies to their list and they are Huawei Technologies Co, ZTE Corp, Hytera Communications Corp, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co and Dahua Technology Co.

It “will continue to update the list as other communications equipment and services meet the criteria under the law,” FCC added. “For Chinese firms, being included on the list has a limited impact due to the tiny business scale,” Xiang Ligang, director-general of the Information Consumption Alliance, an industry association was saying as quoted by Global Times.

The FCC, on March 16, decided to cancel the right of the Chinese telecom company, Pacific Networks Corp and its wholly-owned subsidiary ComNet (USA) LLC to provide relevant telecom services in the US, according to Global Times.

Meanwhile, China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, on Thursday, urged the US to withdraw its decision against the two Chinese telecom companies. Last year, three Chinese telecom companies, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom were delisted from the New York Stock Exchange, as per the US investment restriction imposed in 2020.

Meanwhile, on Thursday (local time), US President Joe Biden said that he has amply made it clear to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping of the potentially dire economic consequences if China provides assistance to Russia.

On the possibility of China providing assistance to Russia, Biden said he had a “very straightforward conversation” with Chinese President Xi Jinping last week on the topic. “I think that China understands that its economic future is much more closely tied to the West than it is to Russia. And so I am hopeful that he does not get engaged,” Biden said.

He made these remarks on the Russian invasion of Ukraine during a news conference after a NATO summit and Group of Seven meeting at North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) headquarters in Brussels on March 24.

Earlier, on March 18, US President also held a video call with Jinping and warned China of implications and consequences if China provides material support to Russia. (ANI)