The moves come amid growing U.S.-China tensions over trade and technology in which Huawei has been a central target.

 

The newspaper quoted Huawei's chief strategy architect, Dang Wenshuan, as saying that American citizens employed in R&D were sent back to U.S. two weeks ago, after the Chinese group and 68 affiliates were placed on the U.S. Commerce Department's 'Entity List,' that effectively bars American enterprises from selling technology to Huawei without government approval.

 

The FT reported a workshop underway at Huawei at the time was 'hastily disbanded, and American delegates were inquired to take away their laptops, isolate their networks and leave the Huawei premises.' It quoted Dang as saying that Huawei is also limiting connections between its employees and American citizens.

 

Huawei declined to comment on the FT report.

 

China's commerce ministry reported Friday that it is going to establish its own list of foreign companies, organizations and individuals it deems to be 'unreliable entities' — a possible response to the U.S. blacklist.

 

Entities are 'unreliable' if they 'fail to stick to market rules, break from the spirit of contracts and block or stop supplying Chinese enterprise for non-commercial motives, badly damaging the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises,' ministry spokesman Gao Feng mentioned at a news briefing.

 

Gao said the precise actions to be taken against the entities will be reported at a later date. The purpose of the list is to oppose unilateralism and trade protectionism, as well as safeguard China's national security, he said.

 

This article is originally posted on tronserve.com