The Chinese smartphone maker has challenged the decision taken by the Trump administration just before the ex-president’s departure.
Chinese phone maker Xiaomi must be temporarily removed from a blacklist placed by the Trump administration, according to a ruling by a judge in the federal capital Washington, pending a court ruling on the bottom.
The American Secretariats for Defense and the Treasury, which had placed the Chinese company on this blacklist, “have not shown that the national security interests at stake here are imperative,” said the judge, in a decision that AFP was able to consult.
Xiaomi is to be removed from this list, at least temporarily, and the ban on US investors from buying Xiaomi shares is suspended. It is also forbidden to call it a “Chinese Communist Military Company”.
Third largest smartphone maker in the world
In its appeal filed in January to challenge and cancel its placement on this blacklist, the phone manufacturer, had denounced a decision “incorrect”, and which “deprived the company of due process”.
Just six days before the end of Donald Trump’s mandate, the US administration made a series of announcements targeting Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi, but also popular video platform TikTok and oil giant CNOOC.
Xiaomi, which overtook Apple by becoming the world’s third-largest smartphone maker in 2020, is one of nine Chinese companies to be on the blacklist. The Trump administration accused her of ties to the Chinese military.
This measure was the ultimate realization of four years of diplomatic tensions between Beijing and Washington under the presidency of Donald Trump.
Huawei still struggling
The judge’s decision comes as the US telecoms regulator (FCC), also Friday, classified five Chinese telecom equipment companies, including Huawei and ZTE, as a threat to national security.
This announcement, in line with the measures taken by the Trump administration, shower the hopes of the founder and boss of Huawei, Ren Zhengfei, who in February called the Biden administration to “a policy of openness”.
The telecoms juggernaut has been at the center of the Sino-American rivalry for several years, against the backdrop of a trade and technological war between the two leading world powers. Huawei had found itself in the crosshairs of the Trump administration, which accused it, without providing any evidence, of espionage.
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