Financial News
- 10 October 2012, 7:15
Huawei And ZTE 'Pose Threat To US Security'
Fears of a technology trade war have escalated after a US congressional report said two Chinese telecoms companies should not be conducting business in America on national security grounds.
The investigation concluded that Huawei and ZTE could not be trusted to be free of influence from Beijing, in a move that thwarted the companies' operational ambitions in the US.
Huawei, the world's second-largest maker of routers and other telecoms gear, and ZTE, the fifth-largest, have struggled to make inroads in the US for years.
The House of Representatives' Intelligence Committee feared that China could use equipment made by the two companies to spy on certain communications and threaten vital systems through computerised links.
The panel urged network providers and others to seek other vendors for their projects and suggested regulators block any future business tie-ups involving Huawei or ZTE and US companies.
The decision is a particular blow for Huawei which already has a US presence with its handset sales.
It had hoped the probe would remove suspicions that had killed its bid for US communications company 3Com and US server technology firm 3Leaf.
Company spokesman William Plummer said the panel's recommendations would set a "monstrous, market-distorting, trade-distorting policy precedent that could be used in other markets against American companies".
The Chinese government reacted by urging Washington to "set aside prejudices".
The report was released at a very sensitive time for US-China relations, ahead of the US presidential and congressional elections and a transition of power to a new leadership in China.
Tensions have recently been edging higher following a series of trade actions against China by President Barack Obama.
He blocked a privately owned Chinese company from building wind turbines close to a US military site and challenged Chinese car and car parts subsidies in a World Trade Organisation case.
Mr Obama's Republican opponent, Mitt Romney, says if elected he will label China a currency manipulator from day one.
what do you think?
Brian E Gorton
One or two nations make all the goods DISASTER is the end product for world trade!!
fish41
Yanks want them out so that they themselves can take pole position in industrial espionage (check out US Full Spectrum Domination). Yanks are world leaders in slowly destroying lives--------Mcdonalds, KFC, Coke
gengisken1227
You just cannot trust China on anything. I read of a story where a British manufacturer sold a golf club machine to the Chinese, after delivery he hadn't walked out of the door before they began stripping it down to copy. Needless to say, he never sold another machine and the Chinese became the world's largest manufacturer and exporter.
shirley sutton
correct me if i'm wrong but aren't most of apples products assembled in china? What will the yanks do if the chinese kick all of the american companies who have things made there on the cheap so they can make huge profits????
Adrian Wagstaff
That girl at the start of the video is really pretty. It's strange how the last time I said, "Perhaps, my Asian television set has a spy camera in it?" The authorities suggested that was reason enough to put me in a psychiatric hospital and yet the American government are now stating the very same fact and they are promoting themselves as being sane?
chris
10:00am on 9/10/2012
It's a bit late..as I sit here, all my clothes are china made, every bit of computer equipment and all the radio comms gear I sell...all China/HK. The only 'British' bit of the internet world I see is the old BT copper cable to the house!
Phil A
11:13am on 9/10/2012
The copper comes from Zambia and the cable is made somewhere else.
chris
9:03am on 11/10/2012
Nah Phil...mines so old it came from Parys mountain! (Isle of Anglesey..Ynys Mon)