China imposes export controls on 10 US companies

BEIJING: China imposed export controls on 10 US companies involved in defence and rare-earth mining in response to Washington’s blacklist and banned public procurement from dozens more firms, Beijing said Monday.

The move comes a month after US President Donald Trump visited Beijing, seeking to stabilise fraught relations during talks with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.

However, Washington later released a new blacklist of 80 companies and their subsidiaries it said were aiding the Chinese military, prompting Beijing to threaten retaliation.

China’s new export controls come “in response to the US government’s egregious act of adding to its so-called ‘Chinese military enterprise list'”, the commerce ministry said in a statement, adding the move was also to “safeguard national security”.

The 10 entities include Aveox, which holds aerospace defence contracts with the US military, and Oshkosh Defense, which produces military vehicle fleets.

China’s finance ministry simultaneously announced a ban on agencies involved in public procurement from buying products made by 46 US firms, including Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Boeing’s defence division.

Companies with US investments in China are excluded, according to a statement from the finance ministry, which said measures would take effect from Monday.

The US blacklist saw tech giants Alibaba and Baidu added, as well as electric vehicle giant BYD.