China tried to insert a provision into an investment deal with the European Union that would allow Beijing to refuse benefits to EU states that restricted activity of Chinese telecommunication companies such as Huawei, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) newspaper reported Friday, citing reviewed documents
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th January, 2021) China tried to insert a provision into an investment deal with the European Union that would allow Beijing to refuse benefits to EU states that restricted activity of Chinese telecommunication companies such as Huawei, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) newspaper reported Friday, citing reviewed documents.
In late December, Beijing and Brussels finalized the long-awaited deal, which had been in the works since 2013. The deal is said to give more access to EU companies operating in China in areas such as financial services, telecommunications, healthcare, logistics and industrial production.
The footnote was detected in a draft text of the agreement, dated December 11, saying that China reserves the right to refuse to allow EU companies to own 50 percent ownership rights on internet data centers, i.e. licenses to host cloud computing in the country, if they are from countries that discriminate against Chinese telecommunications companies.
This, in essence, would leave companies from countries that banned Huawei from accessing their 5G networks without cloud computing access, per the SCMP.
According to the news outlet, the footnote was highlighted in yellow and struck-through with a blue line, meaning it is unlikely to have made it in the final version.
An EU spokeswoman refused to comment on the matter but did say that China is committed "to market access in value added telecommunication services, including cloud services - currently under foreign investment ban - subject to equity cap."
In Europe, Huawei has been banned from 5G networks in Sweden and the UK. Additionally, North Macedonia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Latvia and Estonia all have joint security declarations with Washington, which also effectively removes the Chinese tech giant from 5G development there.
