Asserting that Chinese technology giant Huawei is a national security concern for the United States, President Donald Trump on Wednesday said doing business with the company is not part of the ongoing trade negotiations with China.
"It's a national security concern. Huawei is a big concern of our military, of our intelligence agencies. And we are not doing business with Huawei," Trump told reporters at the White House.
He was responding to questions on the Chinese technological giant, which almost monopolizes in 5G technology, that has not been banned from major parts of the US.
"It'll stop almost completely in a very short period of time. And we'll see what happens with respect to China. But Huawei has been not a player that we want to discuss, we want to talk about, right now," Trump said.
"We're not going to be doing business with Huawei. We're going to do our own business, you know, the old-fashioned way. We'll do right from within the United States, which is what I've been saying for a long time," said the US President in response to a question.
Vice President Mike Pence said in Iceland, where he is currently travelling, that he is encouraged that Iceland has recognized the profound issues that arise from any free nation, embracing the technology and equipment of Huawei.
"Huawei is essentially a Chinese company that, under Chinese law, is required to turn over all of the data that it collects to the Chinese government and the Communist Party," he said.
"The reality is we don't believe that that's consistent with the security of free nations. We don't believe it's consistent with the privacy of people that enjoy freedom in nations like the United States and Iceland," Pence said.
He urged Iceland to join the US in calling on nations across this alliance to reject Huawei technology.
The United States is taking a strong stand on free and fair and reciprocal trade with China, he said.
"We just had a new round of tariffs that we announced that were imposed on China. President Trump will continue to take a strong stand until we see China begin to open their markets and begin to recognize the international rules of commerce that govern the interaction between Iceland and America, and nations all across the globe. And we remain very hopeful,” Pence said.
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