China says it opposes any US actions against Chinese software firms

BEIJING: China said on Monday it was firmly opposed to any U.S. actions against Chinese software companies, responding to remarks by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that Washington will take action shortly against Chinese firms while accusing them of feeding data to Beijing’s government.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters during a daily briefing that China hopes the U.S. can stop its discriminatory policies.

Earlier, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that President Donald Trump will take action shortly on Chinese software companies.

“President Trump has said ‘enough’ and we’re going to fix it and so he will take action in the coming days with respect to a broad array of national security risks that are presented by software connected to the Chinese Communist Party,” Pompeo said on Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures.”

The news comes after Trump told reporters onboard Air Force One on Friday that he would issue an order for social media platform TikTok to be banned in the United States as early as Saturday.

In response, under a recent proposal, ByteDance is willing to divest the U.S. operations of TikTok to Microsoft in a bid to make a deal with the White House, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Saturday. That offer has gained some support from allies of the president, including Republican Senator Lindsey Graham.

In a separate interview on Sunday, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which reviews the national security implications of foreign business deals, is looking at the matter.