The US on Tuesday banned China Telecom Corp (中國電信) from operating in the country, citing “significant” national security concerns.
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ordered China Telecom Americas Corp to discontinue its services within 60 days, ending nearly 20 years of operations in the US.
The firm’s “ownership and control by the Chinese government raise significant national security and law enforcement risks,” the FCC said in a statement.
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It gives opportunities for Beijing “to access, store, disrupt, and/or misroute US communications, which in turn allow them to engage in espionage and other harmful activities against the United States,” it said.
“The FCC’s decision is disappointing,” China Telecom spokesman Ge Yu (葛宇) said in an e-mail, Bloomberg News reported. “We plan to pursue all available options while continuing to serve our customers.”
There was no response to an e-mail sent to the press contact at the Chinese embassy in Washington.
The announcement on Tuesday ramped up concerns about further measures against Chinese tech firms and battered shares in such firms listed in New York.
The selling continued yesterday in Hong Kong, where Chinese tech firms experienced hefty selling, pulling the Hang Seng Index 1.6 percent lower.
The Hang Seng Tech Index lost more than 3 percent, with Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊), Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴), JD.com Inc (京東) and XD Inc (心動) among those taking a hit in morning trade.
The move “seems to dampen previous hopes that the US-China relations may be turning for the better,” IG Asia Pte market strategist Yeap Jun Rong said.
It “has raised some doubts as to whether further escalation may bring back more US scrutiny on Chinese technology players,” he said.
China Telecom, China’s largest fixed-line operator, was delisted by the New York Stock Exchange in January, along with fellow state-owned telecoms firms China Mobile Ltd (中國移動) and China Unicom Hong Kong Ltd (中國聯通).
That followed an executive order by then-US president Donald Trump banning investments by Americans in a range of companies deemed to be supplying or supporting China’s military and security apparatus.
The US Department of Justice in April last year threatened to terminate China Telecom’s US dealings, saying that US government agencies “identified substantial and unacceptable national security and law enforcement risks associated with China Telecom’s operations.”
The move “sends a broader message to Beijing, that regardless of who’s president, the US continues to be concerned about the risks posed by Chinese tech firms operating in the US,” the Washinton-based Center for a New American Security’s director of the technology and national security program, Martijn Rasser, told Bloomberg.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
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