China-US ties: Chinese embassy in Brazil hits back as Brasilia joins America’s ‘Clean Network’
- US-led plan is designed to block Chinese tech giant Huawei’s involvement in foreign nations’ 5G networks
- US undersecretary of state Keith Krach describes company as the ‘backbone of the [China’s] surveillance state’
“What the US calls ‘clean networks’ is discrimination, exclusionary and political,” the mission said in a statement released on Thursday.
It came after Brazil on Wednesday signed up to the US-led “Clean Network” proposal, which has already attracted support in dozens of other countries.
The embassy was annoyed by a speech made by Keith Krach, US undersecretary of state for economic growth, energy and environment, at the US embassy in Brasilia on Wednesday, in which he referred to Huawei as the “backbone of the [China’s] surveillance state”.
“Consensus has formed that the Chinese Communist Party cannot be trusted with our most sensitive data and intellectual property,” he said.
China’s ambassador to Brazil Yang Wanming was the first to respond to Krach’s allegations, taking to Twitter on Wednesday to describe them as “shameless” and “full of lies”.
In interviews with Brazilian and Chinese media, Yang also hit back at America’s claims that Huawei posed a security risk to other nations.
China urges neighbours to back its data security ideas, not the US’
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Tuesday that more than 50 countries had now signed up to the proposal.
Krach has been urging Brazil to ban Huawei from its networks for months. In an article he wrote for Brazilian newspaper O Globo in August, he said Washington would even support Brasilia in the event of a backlash from Beijing.
“We stood with the United Kingdom as it retaliated against its decision to ban Huawei from its 5G networks, and we will stand with our Brazilian partners against any Chinese coercion or bullying directed at you,” he said.
China accuses US of intimidating its allies after signing Cyprus up to its Clean Network initiative
The regulatory agency, Anvisa, said it had received more details on the nature of the “adverse incident” that led it to halt trials of Sinovac Biotech’s CoronaVac vaccine, and had “sufficient information to allow vaccination to resume”.
Additional reporting by Reuters