TikTok bill threatens to shut app out of US market

The United States Senate passed legislation on Tuesday requiring widely used social media app TikTok to be divested from its Chinese parent company ByteDance or be shut out of the US market, a move that Beijing has previously denounced strongly.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin didn’t provide further comment on the bill at Wednesday’s daily news conference.

“I and my colleagues and the spokesperson of the Ministry of Commerce have previously made clear China’s principled position,” he told reporters.

The legislation is an updated version of a bill that the US House of Representatives approved in

March. At the time, Wang slammed the bill, saying that the move “puts the US on the opposite side of the principle of fair competition and international trade rules”.

He called the passage of the bill an attempt to “try every means to snatch from others all things that are good”.

The TikTok legislation is part of a $95 billion aid package approved by the US Senate that also includes military aid to Ukraine, Israel and China’s Taiwan.

As the US Congress allocated $8 billion in military support for Taiwan, Wang said that stronger military collusion between the US and Taiwan will not bring about security for the island or change the destiny of the doomed “Taiwan independence” forces.

“It will only increase tensions and the risk of conflict across the Taiwan Strait, and will ultimately be an act of shooting oneself in the foot,” Wang warned.

He urged Washington to stop arming Taiwan and stop undermining stability and peace across the Strait.