Huawei ban: why Asian countries are shunning Trump’s blacklist despite concerns about China’s influence

Fears are growing throughout Asia that a clash of superpowers will end up hurting smaller nations

Trump’s decision to blacklist Huawei, one of China’s most strategically important companies, has roiled global markets

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Nations are facing pressure from the US to avoid using Huawei equipment in their 5G networks. Photo: Reuters

Published: 10:14am, 3 Jun 2019Updated: 5:18pm, 4 Jun 2019

Smoking cigarettes at Singapore’s Shangri-La Hotel, the site of Asia’s most prominent annual defence forum, members of China’s military found themselves surprisingly upbeat over the weekend.

They expected the event to follow a typical routine: the US and its friends gang up on China, leaving it alone to push back against a host of complaints. But this year, with an escalating trade war threatening global growth, the People’s Liberation Army officers heard other Asian leaders critiquing key aspects of the Trump administration’s attacks on China.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong set the tone in his opening remarks, calling on the US to accommodate China’s rise while downplaying the threat posed by Huawei.

A Myanmar minister suggested US warnings about China’s debt-trap diplomacy were overblown. And nearly everyone wanted the trade war to end.

“What is at stake is the existing global order, that even if not perfect has ensured peace and progress these last 70 years,” Singapore Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen told the Shangri-La Dialogue. “It would be an egregious folly to throw this baby out with the bath water.”