Huawei is benefiting from the easing of U.S. sanctions on it as the country granted billions of dollars in licenses to the Chinese conglomerate between November 2020 and April 2021.
In May 2019, Donald Trump’s acting chief put Huawei on a U.S. Commerce Department blacklist. An executive order issued by the former U.S. president prevented Huawei from using U.S. technologies. U.S. suppliers who want to work with Huawei must apply for a license.
First, suppliers must prove to the government that the technologies sold to Huawei will not pose a danger to the country. Initially, the U.S. systematically denied all licensing requests out of concern for national security. However, the situation has changed since last November when the US issued 113 export licenses to suppliers who wanted to sell the technology to Huawei. Reuters reported that the approved products were worth $61 billion.
During this period, 69% of huawei’s supply requests were approved by the U.S. According to Reuters, 80 of the 113 licenses issued are not for sensitive goods. However, not all approved licenses have been used when some companies have not yet used them. It is known that the licenses are valid for 4 years.
Of course, this easing was not welcomed by some senators who supported former President Donald Trump’s anti-China policy. Republican Senator Marco Rubio said: “This is just another example of President Biden not taking the economic and security threat posed by the Chinese government seriously. “It is in our national interest to increase transparency and public scrutiny of how our nation transfers our technology to our adversaries.”
Since taking office, Joe Biden has refused to lift sanctions imposed by his predecessor, despite huawei and its partners speaking out. However, it appears that sanctions are being imposed at a lighter rate than in the Trump era.
