Justice Dept Charges China’s Huawei With Violating Iran Sanctions

This week, the US will hold trade talks with China, which the White House is insisting is totally unrelated to the 23 charges the Justice Department has just filed against major Chinese telecom Huawei. The charges center on violating US sanctions against Iran, and ‘stealing trade secrets.’

These charges are part of a growing Trump Administration effort against Huawei, mostly focusing on keeping them from bidding on major infrastructure contracts around the world. It is also the pretext for having Canada capture the company’s CFO and try to extradite her to America.

The US accuses the company of using a subsidiary called Skycom to do business with Iran and to make a profit in violation of US sanctions. They also claim the evidence supporting this was destroyed by Huawei.

The capture of Ms. Meng has fueled tensions between China and Canada, and forced Canada’s Ambassador to China to be sacked over the weekend. The ambassador was fired for saying that Meng could make a case against being extradited to the US, which is “inconsistent with the position of the government of Canada.”