China has accused the United States of breaking World Trade Organization (WTO) rules by ordering a ban on new downloads of Chinese apps TikTok and WeChat. The Beijing officials made the allegations at a closed-door WTO meeting last week.
A representative for China said that the actions of the Trump administration “are clearly inconsistent with WTO rules, restrict cross-border trading services and violate the basic principles and objectives of the multilateral trading system,” Reutersreports citing an anonymous trade official familiar with the matter.
The Chinese delegate said that the US has no evidence to support their claims of the apps being a threat to national security. The American government’s actions are a “clear abuse” of the rules, the delegate added.
In the same meeting, however, a representative for the US defended the Trump administration’s actions reiterating that they are intended to mitigate national security risks. The US has time and again claimed that apps like WeChat and TikTok may have backdoors for the Chinese government. This compromises the privacy of American users and poses a threat to national security. However, the US government hasn’t been able to support those claims with concrete evidence.
China complains WTO of the US ban on Chinese apps
The ever-growing trade war between China and the US, the world’s two most powerful economies, entered a new dimension after the Trump administration issued executive orders in July to ban TikTok in the nation. ByteDance, the Chinese parent of the popular video-sharing app, was asked to divest its US operations to an American company or face a nationwide ban.
While TikTok has promised a structural change in partnership with Oracle, the Trump administration has yet to approve that arrangement. In the meantime, the US asked mobile app stores in the nation to remove both WeChat and TikTok.
However, US judges have questioned those decisions and put a hold on the ban. The United States Department of Justice has now filed a notice of appeal against this preliminary injunction. The DOJ has asked the court to reinstate the government’s restrictions.
Amidst all this, China has now taken to WTO to voice against these measures. The statement made by the Chinese delegate at the meeting will not have any consequences on its own. However, China could always file an official legal complaint about this to the global body.
Not just the US, but China also accused India of the same for banning TikTok and several other Chinese apps. The Indian government has banned more than 180 Chinese-origin apps over the past few months citing security reasons. It’ll be interesting to see if China files an official complaint against either of India and the US. Chinese representatives to the WTO did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.