- Conservative MPs are stepping up their campaign to remove Huawei from the UK’s 5g network.
- Boris Johnson is expected to announce plans to phase out the Chinese telecoms firm by 2029.
- However, a sizable group of MPs in Johnson’s conservative party want Huawei to be eliminated by 2023.
- These MPs reportedly threaten to launch a sustained campaign of rebellion in Parliament.
- The former MI6 chief said on Monday that the UK should exclude Huawei from its infrastructure.
- US sanctions on Huawei mean it poses an even greater risk to UK security, according to an official security report.
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Boris Johnson faces a sustained campaign of rebellion by dozens of his own members of Parliament until he agrees to speed up the removal of Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei from the UK’s 5G network.
The UK Prime Minister is expected to reverse his decision to give Huawei a limited but significant role in the development of UK 5G, amid growing hostility towards the company and China within his conservative party.
Johnson is expected to establish plans this month to phase out Huawei from the UK network, according to The Financial Times, with a report by the UK’s National Center for Cyber Security to warn that U.S. sanctions on the company mean that represents a greater risk to UK Security.
The sanctions recently introduced by the Trump administration are designed to prevent Huawei from using equipment produced in the United States to manufacture semiconductors. This has raised concerns in London that the Chinese telecommunications company would resort to different technologies with an additional security risk.
The Johnson government in the UK currently intends to reduce Huawei’s share of the UK network over time before eventually eliminating the company entirely by 2029, according to multiple recent reports.
However, a significant number of Conservative MPs want the Prime Minister to speed up this process by pledging to remove Huawei from the UK network by 2023. They argue that Huawei should not have a role in the UK network when Britain goes to the polls for their Next general election in 2024.
About 60 conservative MPs threaten to thwart Johnson’s legislative agenda if he does not agree to do so, The Telegraph reports.
They plan to do this by tabling amendments to Huawei and China in multiple laws brought before the House of Commons until Johnson agrees to take a more aggressive approach to Huawei, the newspaper says.
The UK Prime Minister criticized Conservative party MPs when he reached an agreement with Huawei earlier this year.
In March, he experienced a rebellion by conservative MPs, and the first real challenge to his power since he won the UK general election in December, when nearly 40 voted against his government in Parliament.
Opposition to the deal has grown since then, with numerous conservative MPs establishing a parliamentary bloc called The China Research Group calling on the UK government to loosen ties with Beijing.
United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and United Kingdom Secretary of Foreign Affairs Dominic Raab.
Getty
Johnson’s decision also angered allies in the White House, with President Trump hanging up on an “apoplectic” phone call. The United States warned that the agreement with Huawei would give China a back door to western intelligence exchange.
Iain Duncan Smith, a high-ranking conservative who is among the top lawmakers asking Johnson to take a more aggressive approach to Huawei, said the plan to phase out the company by 2029 was “unacceptable.”
He told The Times of London: “It essentially means that companies will still be able to go ahead with Huawei. It has to be out of our system before the end of this parliament.”
Duncan Smith and the other conservative MPs calling for tougher action against Huawei have been fueled by an intervention by former MI6 chief Sir John Sawers.
Writing for the Financial Times, Sawers said that the Trump administration’s decision to stop Trump’s use of American components meant that the United Kingdom would have to exclude the telecommunications company from its networks.
“The Trump administration’s motives for trying to destroy Huawei can be debated,” he wrote.
“But the latest US sanctions, in late June and last week, mean that Huawei’s trusted non-Chinese suppliers are no longer able to work with the company. Therefore, the UK intelligence services can no longer provide The necessary assurances that Chinese-made equipment is still safe to use on the UK telecommunications network. “
Boris Johnson’s official spokesman confirmed Monday that the government was reviewing the deal.
“We have been considering the impact of additional sanctions imposed by the United States government on Huawei and the impact that it could in turn have on the UK network. It is an ongoing process and we will update more in due course,” he said. .
The Chinese ambassador to the United Kingdom warned on Monday that any attempt to scrap the deal would have “consequences” for Britain.
“We want to be your friend. We want to be your partner. But if you want to make China a hostile country, you will have to bear the consequences,” Liu Xiaoming told reporters, according to Reuters.
