Washington's war on Huawei a commercial and geopolitical ploy

The indictment of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies on 13 charges by the US Justice Department on Jan 28 is nothing but the latest US premeditated move to foil China's rise in the field of high-tech.

Huawei's extraordinary success in the global telecom market, especially in developing the critical 5G technology, has prompted the US administration to take its gloves off and resort to despicable actions. They include the detention of Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou on Dec 1 by Canada at the behest of the United States for alleged violations of sanctions against Iran.

Jeffrey Sachs, an economist at Columbia University, described the detention as "really part of the Trump administration's broader attempt to undermine China's economy by imposing tariffs, closing Western markets to Chinese high-technology exports, and blocking Chinese purchases of US and European technology companies".