PM orders a probe into Chinese giant Huawei over 5G network
BORIS Johnson has ordered cyber security chiefs to investigate the Chinese tech giant Huawei.
It comes amid growing concerns about its role in building more than third of the UK’s superfast 5G broadband network, Whitehall sources said yesterday.
The Prime Minister wants to look again at the project following a threatened revolt by Conservative MPs concerned about the links between the firm and Beijing’s spy agencies.
Officials said he had instructed the National Cyber Security Centre to investigate after the US imposed new sanctions on the company.
He also wants Whitehall to investigate whether Huawei can be squeezed out of the 5G project by 2024.
Tory backbenchers hope the move is the beginning of a major rethink of the Government’s decision last year to reluctantly allow the firm to develop the communications technology. Neil O’Brien, a Tory MP who is secretary of the backbench China Research Group, said: “I hope it is true that the Government is to drop Huawei.
“We should get our 5G from a reliable supplier rather than Huawei.
“After American sanctions took away their access to chips, it’s not clear they would even be able to deliver reliably.
“It would be better to buy from a firm that isn’t owned by a bloodstained communist
dictatorship.” A Government spokesman said: “The security and resilience of our networks is of paramount importance.
“Following the US announcement of additional sanctions against Huawei, the National Cyber Security Centre is looking carefully at any impact they could have on the UK’s networks.”
Another Government source did not deny reports that the Prime Minister wanted major rethink about Huawei’s role in the UK 5G network. Over the weekend, Conservative peer and former Hong Kong governor Lord Patten urged the Government to think carefully about Huawei taking part in the telecommunications project.
He said: “We should stop being fooled that somehow at the end of the all the kowtowing there’s this great pot of gold waiting for us.
“It’s always been an illusion. We keep on kidding ourselves that unless we do everything that China wants we will somehow miss out on great trading opportunities. But it’s drivel.”
Mr Johnson is also understood to hope that reducing UK reliance on China will help boost the effort to agree a new trade deal with the US.
Western relations with China have been soured in recent weeks by questions about the origins of the deadly coronavirus in Wuhan.
And the Beijing regime’s attempt to increase its grip on Hong Kong has soured relations further.