Trump says US will discuss dropping charges against Chinese tech giant Huawei in coming weeks
- ‘We’ll be talking to the US attorneys … the attorney general … We’ll be making that decision’, president says
- Trump reiterates earlier comments that he does not want to ‘artificially block people out based on excuses or based on security’
US President Donald Trump said discussions on dropping criminal charges against Chinese telecom giant Huawei will be held in the coming weeks, after the two sides agreed to extend their trade negotiations in Washington for two more days.
In remarks seen as him raising the possibility of using the case as a bargaining chip, Trump said he “may or may not” include Huawei and another Chinese telecom company, ZTE Corp, in the trade deal.
While dropping the charges against Huawei was not currently under consideration, the issue would be raised, he told reporters at the White House during his meeting with Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He.
“We’re going to be discussing all of that during the course of the next couple of weeks,” he said. “We’ll be talking to the US attorneys. We’ll be talking to the attorney general. We’ll be making that decision.”
Huawei and its chief financial officer Sabrina Meng Wanzhou face nearly two dozen charges in the United States, which contends it violated economic sanctions and concealed its business dealings with Iran.
Meng was arrested on December 1 in Canada at the request of the US Justice Department. Although she has denied any wrongdoing, she is currently awaiting extradition proceedings and a hearing has been set for March 6.
A little over a week after Meng’s detention in Vancouver, Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor were arrested in China on separate charges of endangering national security.
According to Xie Maosong, a senior adviser to the Communist Party, the pair’s arrest could be key to securing Meng’s release as early as April.