WILMINGTON, Delaware: The Biden administration is close to tightening rules on some overseas investments by US companies to limit China’s ability to acquire technologies that could improve its military prowess, according to a US official familiar with the deliberations.
The soon-to-be-issued executive order from President Joe Biden will limit American investment in advanced technologies that have national security applications – such as next-generation military capabilities that could help China improve the speed and accuracy of military decision-making, according to the official, who was not authorized to comment and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The expected action is the latest effort by the White House to target China’s military and technology sectors at a time of increasingly fraught relations between the world’s two biggest economies.
In October, the Biden administration imposed export controls to limit China’s ability to access advanced chips, which it says can be used to make weapons, commit human rights abuses, and improve the speed and accuracy of its military logistics.
The complicated relationship has become further strained in recent weeks after the US shot down a Chinese spy balloon last month that traversed the country.
The Biden administration has also publicized US intelligence findings that raise concern Beijing is weighing providing Russia weaponry for its ongoing war on Ukraine.
The tensions were on display as top diplomats from the Group of 20 industrialized and developing nations ended a contentious meeting in New Delhi on Thursday with no consensus on the Ukraine war and concerns about China’s widening global influence dominating much of the talks.
Meanwhile, China this past week blasted the new House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party after it held its first hearing on countering Beijing’s influence. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning demanded its members “discard their ideological bias and zero-sum Cold War mentality.”
Source: AP/nh
